Y//M w. V w& tt(*7 TSSteL (Qntnell Imneiaity Siihraty 3tljaca, N«ta fork Wifitt fijtstorital ICihrarjj THE GIFT OF PRESIDENT WHITE MAINTAINED BY THE UNIVERSITY IN ACCORD- ANCE WITH THE PROVISIONS OF THE GIFT Cornell University Library DL 703.H67 3 1924 028 569 121 DATE DUE Aea-a-anssnnF^ Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028569121 (T7°^™ wn 5 THE HISTORY GUSTAYUS YASA, KING OF SWEDEN. EXTRACTS FROM HIS CORRESPONDENCE. LONDON: JOHN MTJEEAY, ALBEMAELE STEEET. 1852. 765 LONDON : PHINTED BY \V. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFOKD-STREET. PREFACE. The life of Gustavus Vasa, though it has been sepa- rately treated by several Swedish authors, has never yet, I believe, been presented to the English reader as a distinct subject. This certainly has not been because the subject is deficient either in interest or importance, nor is it that there have not existed of late years ample and accessible materials for its development, but chiefly perhaps because the number of English writers acquainted with the Scandinavian languages is still comparatively few, and that the unoccupied fields which those languages have opened to them are many and extensive. It will not, I hope, be deemed superfluous, if I explain the manner in which the present work had its beginning. The early interest which I had taken in Gustavus Vasa from Voltaire's introduction to 'Charles the Twelfth,' and which had been confirmed from other sources, was revived and much increased by the fol- lowing remarks of Mr. Laing on Geijer's history of the Swedes. " The second and third parts give the history of Gustavus Vasa and his successors down to the death a 2 IV PREFACE. of Gustavus Adolphus and the reign and resignation of his daughter Christina. The adventures, as they may be called, of the first Vasa, his exploits, his manly sincere character, his public and domestic life, his racy speeches to the peasantry in the quaint energetic mode of expression which appear to have belonged to the state of society and language in every country about the time of Queen Elizabeth, are given in a spirit truly Shakesperian. This work, although unintentionally, gives a severe shock to the reigning dynasty ; for it paints, with the touch of genius, acts and exploits, sayings and doings, of great men, and striking characters of a native race of kings in picturesque times, opens up a brilliant national history, which before was but dimly seen through obscure or flimsy foreign works, and brings it home to the breasts of the youth of the country, in a literary production of which the nation may be as proud as of the deeds it relates. I envy this man the feeling with which he must walk past the gigantic bust of Gustavus Vasa upon the esplanade of the old palace here (Upsala), from which its frown seems to have scared away the living generation of men, reflecting that he alone has done justice, in unfavour- able times, to the two most disinterested, high, and virtuous characters who have ever appeared in kingly station — Gustavus Vasa, and his grandson Gustavus Adolphus." Happening to meet with this passage during an interval of Comparative leisure, it occurred to me PREFACE. V that I might perhaps employ that leisure to advan- tage in reading Geijer's work, and more particularly the portion which related to Gustavus Vasa, and (if I found this as interesting as Mr. Laing had represented) that it might be worth while to trans- late it, and print it separately with the addition of some explanatory notes.- I had not, however, made much progress in the Professor's history of Gustavus without feeling that it would be better to profit by his labours generally, and in common with those of others, than to tread closely and exclusively in his footsteps. I found that there were — as indeed might have been antici- pated when a Swede had written for Swedes — some things recorded in the history which an Englishman could have spared, and I suspected that many things had been only slightly touched upon or omitted which he would gladly have seen in full detail. As I consulted original authorities to understand allu- sions or to clear up doubts, this suspicion was con- firmed. Besides, those authorities obliged me to view some material points in Gustavus's history in a different light from that in which Geijer had regarded them. Then, again, I thought his arrangement might be deviated from with good effect. Lastly, I conceived that if there were interwoven with the narrative copious extracts from the correspondence of the King, published in the Handlingar of M. Thy- selius and the Diplomatarium Dalekarlicum — with some parts of which Geijer was probably unac- VI PREFACE. quainted, to which, at any rate, he had not given the prominence that, in my opinion, they deserved — a likeness of Gustavus might be produced, which, containing more strokes of his own vigorous pencil, would so far possess an advantage over any previous portrait. The result has been the present Life. Wherein, having had to speak of many things in respect of which I have felt myself somewhat fet- tered by inclination, I have been the more studious on that very account to keep my judgment unre- strained, and to fulfil at least the fundamental duty of an historical biographer, by giving a fair statement of facts, and doing justice, according to my ability, to the persons and parties concerned. 1 To enable those who are not acquainted with Swedish to read some of the proper names, and other Swedish words, which occur in this volume with less difficulty, I venture to lay down the following rough rules of pronunciation. Pronounce a as the a in Father. i , , i in Mill. a , , ea in Feather. a , , o in Rose. 6 (for which we have no corresponding sound in English) as the ie in Field, g before e, i, y, a, b, has usually the sound of y. 1 " Nam quis nescit primam esse historise legem ne quid falsi dicere audeat ? deinde ne quid veri non audeat ? ne qua suspicio gratis sit in scribendo ? ne qua simultatis ? Hsec scilicet fundamenta nota sunt omnibus."— Cic. de Oratore, lib. 2, p. 63. PREFACE. vii Observe particularly also that k before e, i, y, a, 6, is usually sounded like ch in cherry, but after s as h. Thus Skep, Anglice (ship), is pronounced shep. Skilling, , , (shilling), , , shilling. Kama, , , (churn), , , chearna. Koping, , , (chipping, i. e. a market-town), something like chiepping. Skjbld, , , (shield), , , shield. Gardsgard , , (court-yard) , , yeards-gord. Accordingly the following words, which occur frequently in the volume, will be read nearly as follows : — Scania, as if it were written Sconia. Vesteras, , , , , Vesterose. Garden, , , , , Gorden. Ionkoping, , , , , Yienchiepping. Linkbping, , , , , Linchiepping. Words such as Sture, with an accent over the 4, are to be pronounced as dissyllables. Among the authorities consulted by me are : — (1.) Scriptores Rerum Danicarum Medii iEvi. 8 vols. Hafnias, 1772, &c. 1 vol. Petri Olai Chron. 2 vols. Chronicon Skibyense, from 1446 to 1534. The name is borrowed from Skibby, a parish in Zealand, where the MS. was found in 1650 built up in the church-wall behind the altar. 3 vols. Epistolse Christiani I. Dan. Regis. (2.) Scriptores Rerum Sueciarum. Upsaliae, 1818, &c. 1 vol. Svenska Chronica Olai Petri. The author of this Swedish chronicle and his brother were the first preachers of the Reformed religion in Sweden. Vlll PREFACE. 2 vol. Chron. Erici Olai, in Latin. . The author was Dean of Upsala, and died a.d. 1496. His work, which is highly esteemed, is brought down to the year 1464. Ditto Svenska Chronica, Laurentii Petri. The author, the first Protestant Archbishop of Upsala, undertook this work, which was little more than a reproduction of his brother's, at the request of Gustavus, omitting some passages, with which the King was offended, and supplying some defects. Both Chronicles end in 1521. Gustavus's criticism on the Chronicles of Ericus Olai and Olaus Petri will be found in the Appendix to this volume. (3.) Germanicarum Rerum Scriptores aliquot insignes hactenus incogniti ex bibliotheca Marquardi Freheri. Frankfort. Tom. 3, Christierni Secundi Attentata in Sueciae Regnum, &c. A.b. 1517. Jacobo Zieglero. Scriptore. An author living at the time of the massacre in Stockholm. The date 1517 should be 1520. (4.) Historia Johannis Magni, Archiepiscopi Upsaliensis. Romse, 1564. De Omnibus Gothorum Sueonuraque Regibus. Romse, 1564. The author was the last Roman Catholic Archbishop of Sweden. (5.) Handlingar Rorande Sveriges inre Forhallanden under Gustaf. I., ed. P. E. Thyselius. 4 del. Stockholm, 1841-45. These documents, concerning the internal condition of Sweden under Gustavus Vasa, occupy 2 vols. 8vo., chiefly consisting of the King's own letters, copied from the State Register, Riks. Reg. (6.) Diplomatarium Dalekarlicum, ed. C. G. Kroningssvarr och J. Liden. 3 del. 4to. Stockholm, 1842-4-6. Papers and letters, many of "them of Gustavus, bearing more or less on the interests of Dalecarlia. The documents are numbered in this collection, and are quoted by me in the notes and elsewhere by their numbers. PEEFACB. IX (7.) Danraarchis Regis Kroniche. Arrild Hvitfeldt, D.K.C. Copenhagen, 1603, &c. 10 vols. 4to. He -was Chancellor of Denmark in the time of Christian the Fourth. In the copy in the British Museum there is -written on the fly-leaf, " This is the first and best history of the kingdom of Den- mark, haying all the original articles which in the later edition have been altered for political reasons" (Jocher Lexicon, nat. 1550, ob. 1607). 1 (8.) Tegel. Jorenson (Erik) Then Stoormectighe Herre Herr Gustafs Historia. Stockholm. 2 del., 1622, fol. This history was written at the request and under the supervision of Charles the Ninth, the son of Gustavus ; so that the author boasts it may be considered as his Majesty's own work. It is little more than a chronicle of the events of the reign, but valuable both from the number of State documents which it preserves and the circum- stances under which it was written. (9.) Johannis Messenii Scondia Illustrata a Joh. Pering- skjold. The first book was dedicated to Gustavus Adolphus, 1620. Messenius was secretly an earnest Roman Catholic ; and in reading his history it must not be forgotten that he delights in inferences and insinuations to the disadvantage of Gustavus. On the other hand, many things affecting the King are mentioned by him, of which there is no reason to question the truth, but which Protestant Swedish writers fail to notice. (10.) Dalin. Svea Rikes Historia. Stockholm, 1747-50. 4 vols. 4to. (11.) Konung Gustaf Den Forstes Historia, af Olof Celsius, Professor of History at-Upsala. Stockholm, 1775. ' Holberg, who gives the date of his death 1609, says of Hvitfeldt's history, " that it is one of the most precious possessed by any country, as it is a collection of state documents which the author, as Chancellor of the kingdom, had the opportunity of copying out and introducing into his history." — Vol. ii. p. 402. PREFACE. (12.) Sveriges Historia. M. Bruzelius. 3rd ed. Lund, 1830. A popular abridgment. (13.) Svenska Folkets Historia ap Erik Gustaf Geijer. 3 torn. Orebro, 1832, 1834, 1836. This work has been translated into English by Mr, J. H. Turner. (14.) Dannemarks Riges Historie. Ved Ludvig Holberg. 2nd ed. Copenhagen, 1753-54. 3 vols. 4to. (15.) Mallet, Histoire de Dannemarc. Geneva, 1762. The author, who had lived in Denmark from an early age, appears to have been careful in searching out and using the best authorities. (16.) Behrman (Hendrick), Christian den Andens Fosngsels og Befrielses Historia. Kiop., 1812. 8vo. An account of the imprisonment and release of Christian the Second, with documentary proofs. Other works less frequently consulted or better known will be found mentioned in the notes. THE AUTHOR ( xi ) CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. Comparison between Gustavus Vasa, Gustavus Adolphus, and Charles the Twelfth — Sweden after the Treaty of Calmar, 1398 — Union with Norway and Denmark — Eric the Seventh — Eevolts in Dale- carlia — Engelbrect Regent — Assassinated — Regency of Knutson — Death of Eric — Knutson chosen King — His war with Chris- tian the First — Defeat and abdication — Recall and death — Sten Stare" Regent — Christian proclaimed King — Battle of Brunkeberg — Treaty of Calmar renewed — "John declared King — Provisions of the treaty — John defeats the Regent — Revolt of the nobles — Sturd re-elected — His death and policy — Christian the Second — Difficult position of Swedish rulers — Mission of Gustavus Vasa Page 1 CHAPTER II. Ancestry of Gustavus — His birth and childhood — Received at the court of Sten Sturd — ; The Archbishop before the States — Battle of Brankyrka — Treachery of the King — Gustavus prisoner in Denmark — Escapes to Lubeck — '■ His wanderings — Death of the Regent — Battle with the peasants — Stockholm surrendered — The coronation — Didrik Slaghec's counsel — The King's continued perjuries — Massacre in the capital 32 Xll CONTENTS. CHAPTEE III. Gustavus leaves Stockholm, — His wanderings and dangers in Dale- carlia — Elected Captain-General of the kingdom — His first victory — Proceedings of the Government — Their troops defeated — Gustavus declares war against Christian — Takes Vesteras — Siege of the citadel — Great accession to his army — Execution of Slaghec as adviser of the Bloodbath .... Page 56 CHAPTER IV. Attack on Upsala ■ — Capture of the Archbishop's palace — Gustavus retreats — Pursues the Archbishop to Stockholm — Brask, Bishop of Linkoping, joins the patriots — The crown rejected by Gustavus, who is elected Regent — Guerilla war — Siege of Stockholm — The Archbishop leaves Sweden — Christian orders another massacre — Execution of Thomas} the chief perpetrator — Inefficient assistance from Lubeck — The capital submits — Dethronement of Christian — Gustavus elected King of Sweden 1'i CHAPTER V. Accession of Duke Frederic of Holstein to the throne of Denmark — Obtains assistance from Gustavus — Proceedings of Norby in Gothland — Piracy formerly not infamous — Expedition against Gothland — Norby appeals to Frederic — Treaty of Malmo — Siege of Visby abandoned — Calmar, garrisoned by Von Mehlen, recovered by Gustavus — Norby attacks Scania on the part of Christian — Surrenders Gothland to Frederic — His defeat and death 90 CONTENTS. xill CHAPTEE VI. Financial difficulties — Wealth of tlie clergy — The Reformation in Sweden — The brothers Petri — Discussions — Translation of the Scriptures — - The Anabaptists — Judicious conduct of Gustavus — Deposition of the Bishops of Vesteras and Upsala — Their attempts to produce a rebellion in the Dales — The King's letter to the Dean of Upsala — His address to the Dalesmen — Trial and exe- cution of the deposed Bishops — Banishment of Archbishop Johannes Magnus Page 106 CHAPTER VII. Right of the State to tax the Church — Bishop Brask's remonstrances — Surrender of Gripsholm convent — Troops quartered on religious houses — Arbitrary measures to raise a revenue — Rebellion in Dalecarlia — The impostor Jons — Treaty between the King and the Dalesmen — Great meeting at Vester&s — The King's purpose to humble the hierarchy — Resolutions of the Bishops — The King's address to the States — His offer of abdication — Pertur- bation of the meeting — His demands acceded to . . . 128 CHAPTEE VIII. Decrees of Vester&s — Uncontrolled power over Church property given to Gustavus — Privileges of the clergy curtailed — Public decla- ration of the States — Opposition and death of the Bishop of Linkoping — Surrender of tithes — Complaint to Gustavus of non- fulfilment by him of part of the Ordinances — Evacuation and destruction of monasteries — Downfall of the monastic system, and its consequences — Nicolaus Amundi, a monk of Vadstena — Diary of Vadstena convent 155 XIV CONTENTS. CHAPTER IX. Coronation of Gustavus — Continued discontent in the Dales — Exe- cution of the Daleyunker and his council — Religious reforms — Contest with the High Steward — Insurrection — Its causes — The Westgothlanders refuse to join — Act of oblivion — The King's defence of his proceedings — Execution of Brynteson and Olfson Page 170 CHAPTER X. Arrangements for discharging the debt to Lubeck — General dis- satisfaction — Riots in the Dales — Unsuccessful attempt of Christian on Sweden — Murder of the High Steward — Treaty between Frederic and Christian — Violated by Frederic — Chris- tian's imprisonment, death, and character .... 188 CHAPTER XI. Marriage of Gustavus — His determination to humble the Dalesmen — Execution of their leaders — War between Lubeck and Holland — Claims of Lubeck — Their validity denied by Gustavus — Birth of an hoir — The Lubeckers revive the claims of Christian and make war on Denmark — Gustavus supports the Danes — Siege of Copenhagen — Triumph of the allies, and acknowledgment of Christian the Third — Results -of the war — Conspiracy to assassi- nate Gustavus — Condemnation of Olaus Petri and Lars Anderson for not revealing the plot . 200 CHAPTER XII. Death of Queen Catherine — The King marries Margaret Abrahamson — Rebellions in Smaland — The Dacke" war — Negotiations with Dacke" — Hostilities renewed — The King's instructions to his lieutenant — Termination of the civil war — Treaty with Russia — Threatened rupture with Denmark — Peace of Bromsebro . 216 CONTENTS. XV CHAPTER XIII. Ecclesiastical changes — Gustavus claims absolute supremacy in Church and State — The succession confirmed to his heirs — Increase of the army — Promotion of learning — His care for the prosperity of the people, and improvement of the resources of the kingdom — Commercial treaties — Establishment of a navy — Advice to his sons — Letters, &c, illustrative of this chapter . . Page 231 CHAPTER XIV. Assumption by Christian of the arms of Sweden — Remonstrance of Gustavus — War with Russia, and treaty of peace — Death of Queen Margaret — Gustavus marries Catherine Stenbock — His will — Discontent of Eric — His proceedings at Calmar — Seeks the hand of the Princess Elizabeth of England — Prince John's unsuccessful mission — Marriage of the Princess Catherine — Imprudent conduct of the Princess Cecilia — Grief of the King .... 268 CHAPTER XT. Unhappiness of Gustavus's latter days — His decline — His latest correspondence — His last address to the States — - Renewal of Eric's suit to Elizabeth of England — The King's illness and death — Peter Brahd's description of him — Eeview of his cha- racter 282 Appendix 299 GUS'TAVUS VASA. ERRATA. Preface, page vii., for " Sueciarum," read " Suecicarum." Page 114, note, for " Suecarum," read " Suecicarum." , , 143, line 1, for " except," read " where." ,, 156, for " (fralsejord), lands upon which no quit-rent had been reserved ; lands paying quit-rent (skattejord)," read " (fralse- jord) , lands freed from the more onerous and degrading state- burdens : lands liable to these burdens (skattejord)." , , 163, line 23, for " accelerate,'' read " anticipate." « -M.-vyu \A7XU " mencing about the year 1520, acquired an imperish- able glory from the great princes who, at various -intervals, occupied the throne. Few royal names are more illustrious, or have conferred more honour upon their country, than those of Gustavus Vasa, Gus- tavus Adolphus, and Charles the Twelfth. Not only were their reigns distinguished by deeds of great bril- liancy and importance, but those deeds were their own, suggested or modified by themselves, achieved after the characteristic fashion of each, by political GUS'TAVUS VASA. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. Comparison between Gustavus Vasa, Gustavus Adolphus, and Charles the Twelfth — ■ Sweden after the Treaty of Calmar, 1398 — Union with Norway and Denmark — Brio the Seventh — Eevolts in Dale- carlia — Engelbrect Eegent — Assassinated — Begency of Knutson — Death of Eric — Knutson chosen King — His war with Chris- tian the First — Defeat and abdication — Recall and death — Sten Sture 1 Eegent — Christian proclaimed King — Battle of Brunkeberg — Treaty of Calmar renewed — John declared King — Provisions of the treaty — John defeats the Eegent — Eevolt of the nobles — Stare 1 re-elected — His death and policy — Christian the Second — Difficult position of Swedish rulers — Mission of Gustavus Vasa. The realm of Sweden, during the two centuries com- mencing about the year 1520, acquired an imperish- able glory from the great princes who, at various -intervals, occupied the throne. Few royal names are more illustrious, or have conferred more honour upon their country, than those of Gustavus Vasa, Gus- tavus Adolphus, and Charles the Twelfth. Not only were their reigns distinguished by deeds of great bril- liancy and importance, but those deeds were their own, suggested or modified by themselves, achieved after the characteristic fashion of each, by political a 2 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. wisdom, military genius, and daring courage. Hence, comparing them together, Charles the Twelfth was the greatest hero, and Gustavus Adolphus the greatest general ; but Gustavus Vasa was the greatest king. The others were too much captivated or too busy with war and conquest, to give sufficient heed to that domestic policy which, properly conceived and admi- nistered, gives a sovereign, not the most brilliant indeed, but the best title to a nation's gratitude and admiration. Gustavus, on the contrary, without neg- lecting the defence of his kingdom — after he had freed it from foreign rulers — devoted himself chiefly to its internal improvement, to the reformation of its institutions, and to the development of its resources ; and the intelligence he showed in choosing fit times and fit instruments for what he meant to do, his moral courage in difficult and critical junctures, and the laborious perseverance by which he finally esta- blished peace and an efficient government in the place of anarchy and misrule, justly entitle him to a high rank among the kings, not only of his own, but of all other nations. The abatements to be made from this general commendation, and the faults, which, while they lessened the usefulness of Gustavus as a monarch, tarnished also his character as a man, will appear in the following history. But in order justly to appre- ciate his position, and the peculiar obstacles which he had to surmount, it will be necessary to throw a glance over the annals of the kingdom, from the Chap. I. UNION WITH NORWAY AND DENMARK. 3 union of the Crowns of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden by the Treaty of Calmar in 1398, until the time when he, who was destined to dissolve that treaty, appears upon the scene. The union, which was accomplished mainly by the prudence and management of Margaret, widow of Hakan, King of Norway, finds little favour with the Swedish historians, ancient or modern. Lauren- tius Petri says, that " Queen Margaret's union was profitable to the Swedes, if it was to their profit to be the Danes' bondmen." 1 Geijer calls it "a hasty, imperfect work, concluded without the assent, or even without the knowledge, of the kingdom generally." Plausible reasons, however, were not wanting to re- commend it, in the outset, to all the nations whom it joined together. It promised many of the advan- tages which have been actually realized by the union of England and Scotland. It promised to put an end to the feuds by which the different parts of Scandinavia had hitherto been distracted, to combine within the limits of one united kingdom territorial advantages of no ordinary kind, and to give to each member of the confederacy, while still retaining its separate customs and domestic arrangements, a strength beyond its own, to resist the encroachments or to retaliate the injuries of more powerful states. It was evident, however, that the success of the ex- periment would depend much upon the fidelity with 1 Svensk. Chron. Laur. Pet. 151 ; Script. Rer. Suec, vol. ii. B 2 4 GUSTAVUS VASA. • Chap. I. which the different stipulations of the treaty were carried out. The footing upon which the three nations were united was that of perfect equality. To depress any one member of the union therefore, to neglect its interests, to exhaust its means for objects distinct from the common good, to place stu- diously over its most important charges chiefs not chosen from its own citizens, was at once a breach of the spirit, and even of the letter of the treaty, and a step towards its dissolution. Margaret herself first introduced the elements of discord, during the time that she was in effect Queen, by her fond partiality for her Danish subjects, to whom she committed the chief posts and fortresses of Sweden, by the new and heavy imposts which she levied there, by her prodigality to the clergy, and her avowed policy of humbling the nobles of the land. 1 But it was Eric the Seventh, her grand- nephew, who by the Treaty of Calmar was elected to the triple crown, with a reservation of the rights and privileges of Margaret, that after her decease in- flamed the discontent, until it broke out into open rebellion. 2 Occupied wholly with his war against 1 She was accordingly in very different odour with the two nations. " Hsec Begina tantse celebritatis exstitit apud Danos ut earn sestiment sanctam, et canonizatione dignam. Apud Suecos vero putatur pro- fundissimo digna inferno." — Erici Olai Chron., lib. 5, p. 121. Among the objectionable taxes which she renewed or originated was one which the people called Eumpo-skatt ; it was virtually a poll-tax. — Olai Petri ; Svensk Chron., p. 279. 2 He married in 1406 ' Philippa, daughter of our Henry the Fourth, Chap. I. ENGELBRECT— RE VOLTS IN DALECARLIA. 5 the Counts of Holstein, extracting from Sweden con- tinually fresh supplies of blood and treasure, and that for a quarrel in which Sweden herself was little in- terested, placing over her people Danes and Germans to pillage and oppress them, and above all turning a deaf ear to their repeated complaints, a civil war was kindled, which, checked from time to time, still broke out afresh, and was to be extinguished only, after a hundred years of discord and bloodshed, by the disruption of the union itself. 1 The government of Dalecarlia had been committed to a Danish nobleman named Erickson, who exer- cised there every species of cruelty and oppression. Men were suffocated in their homes, women with child and newly delivered harnessed to ploughs and waggons, property confiscated upon the slightest occa- sions and pretexts. Complaints of these severities had been forwarded to the King, but Erickson had always contrived to anticipate them by counter-accu- sations, or in some other way to neutralise their effect. 2 At length there rose up from among the Dalesmen (Dalecarlians) themselves one who under- took their cause, and vowed to avenge them. His name was Engelbrect, a Bergsman, and of the lower a princess of great virtue, understanding, and courage. She lived unhappily with her husband, who neglected her, and is said to have caused her death by personal ill-treatment. She died in the convent of Vadstena in the year 1480. — Diarium-Vadstenense, p. 149 ; Olai Petri, p. 283. 1 Olai Petri, p. 282. a Erici Olai, p. 126 ; Johan. Magni Hist., lib. 22-4. 6 GUSTAVTJS VASA. Chap. I. order of nobles. 1 He was short of stature, but of commanding abilities, active, courageous, persevering, eloquent, and popular in his manners, and he com- bined with these natural advantages the experience acquired by intercourse with other countries and with courts. He became Erickson's accuser, and painted his atrocities at the Danish court in the liveliest colours. The King, struck with what he heard, ordered an inquiry, and the charges were ultimately made good before the Swedish state-council. Armed with their report Engelbrect returned to Denmark and demanded the punishment of the offender, but the King had changed his mind or was weary with the subject, and drove him from his presence. 8 The report of his reception was the signal for revolt. The Dalesmen rose, elected him their leader, marched against Vesteras in the autumn of 1433, and though induced by some of the state-council who were there to return home again, did not disperse without an oath never again to pay taxes to Erickson. An attempt to exact these produced a second insur- rection, but the state-council having now persuaded Erickson to give up his command, the Dalesmen were once more quieted. Erickson himself took 1 "Ingenuusseu libertus, sed statura pusillus, in curiis principum nutritus, facundus et fortis." — lb. " Mediocri nobilitate conspicivus utpote libertino patre natus." — Johannes Magnus, lib. 22-4. The word Bergsman means a mountaineer or a miner — here, probably, a proprietor of mines. » Erici Olai, p. 126. Chap. I. ENGELBRECT ASSUMES THE COMMAND. 7 refuge in the convent of Vadstena, from whence, two years after, he was dragged out by the peasantry and put to death. 1 The lull which succeeded Erickson's retirement was of short duration. He was replaced by a foreign count, whose lieutenant in the Dales still oppressed the people. Therefore on Midsummer day, 1434, they rose as one man, resolved to drive all foreigners from the kingdom. Their first attack was upon a fortress called Borganess, situated on a little island in the river that flows through their district (Dalel- fven). This was levelled to the ground. They then marched against Kbping Castle, which met with the same fate. The commandant at Vesteras, after three days, surrendered. Engelbrect took possession, and gave the command to the father of Eric Puke, a young nobleman then in Finland, but who soon after became an important acquisition to the popular cause. Assisted by him Engelbrect carried the war into JSordland and Upland, obtained possession, by fear, or force, or favour, of many additional fortresses, and finally laid siege to Stockholm itself. Here he concluded a truce with the commandant, and at Orebro united his forces to those of Puke. 2 1 lb. anno 1436. " Concep. B. Virginia captus est Jo. Erickson per ruaticos in domibus proouratoris sororum, qui quamvis essent moniti, ne violarent imnrunitates et privilegia monasterii, minime curaverunt, sed duxerunt tanquam ovem ad Motala et ibi eum crudeliter decapita- verunt." — Diar. Vadst., p. 153. It is added, in 1437, " Fecerunt emendam prsedicti rustici." 1 Erici Olai, p. 129. 8" GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. Orebro and Nykoping had just capitulated, when he heard that the States were assembled at Vadstena. Taking a lifeguard of one thousand men with him, he went thither, entered unbidden into the Hall of Assembly, and compelled the council to renounce their allegiance to Eric. He despatched the act of renunciation, dated the 16th August, 1434, to Den- mark, and pursued his triumphant career. 1 Within about three months of the meeting at Vadstena he had taken nearly thirty castles and for- tresses, and the whole of Halland, which, with SdLnia and Blekinge, had once belonged to Sweden, but now formed part of the Danish territory. Stegeholm and Stockholm were the only fortresses still held (under certain stipulated conditions) by foreign command- ants; the rest were either held by Swedes or destroyed. His army, which at last reached one hundred thousand men, was during this time under such perfect discipline that private property was respected in the minutest particulars. 2 A fleet, which the King fitted out to repress this formidable insurrection, was scattered by a tempest ; his own ship was wrecked ; and when he arrived at Stockholm Engelbrect appeared suddenly before the town and occupied all the posts and roads in the neighbourhood. The King, thus anticipated, and pressed at once by the enemy and by famine, was 1 Erici Olai, p. 131. » " Adhuc commemorari solet Engelberti exercitum nee valorem quidem unius galliiue alicui violenter abstulisse." — Johan. Magni, lib. 22-4. Chap. I. ENGELBBECT ELECTED EEGENT. 9 glad to obtain a suspension of arms, upon condition that twelve arbiters, four from each of the united kingdoms, should assemble in October of the following year for the redress of grievances. In the mean time Engelbrect was unanimously elected Eegent at Arboga in the beginning of 1435. That his army might not be altogether idle during the truce, he employed it in making the canal of South Telge, to connect the navigation of the Baltic and Lake Malar. 1 Eric came to Stockholm the following year, when a new arrangement was made with him. The for- tresses and provinces taken from the crown were to be restored. On the other hand the King undertook to govern the country by Swedish law, to revive the high offices of Biksdrots (steward) and Kiksmarsk (marshal), not to levy taxes without consent of the council, and to place over all the fortresses of the kingdom, with the exception of Stockholm, Nyko- ping, and Calmar, native commandants. Christopher Nilson, of the house of Vasa, was appointed Biks- drots, and Charles Knutson, Of the Bondes, Riks- marsk? The latter asked the King for instructions. Eric, who had no doubt detected his ambitious cha- racter, told him, with a homely sententiousness of which he seems to have been fond, " not to stretch his feet beyond his bear-skin." 3 On another occasion, ' Erici Olai, pp. 133, 134. s " Bogant insuper ut duos eis officiates regno omnino necessarios deputaret, Dapiferum scilicet et Marscalcum ne regnum staret sine justitia et ordine convivendi." — Erici Olai, p. 135 ; Olai Petri, p. 289. 3 Eimchronica, p. 217. 10 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. when he thought the demands of the people some- what extravagant, he informed them that he did not mean to be their "Ja-herre," i.e., a king to say " Yes " to everything they proposed. 1 Eric, however, if slow to assent, was still slower to carry out that to which he had assented. Danes and Swedes odious to the people were placed in command of the ceded fortresses ; and instead of that due administration of justice which had been pro- mised, the King's followers on his way back to Den- mark landed at different parts of the coast and plun- dered the peasantry. An attempt of the King, who was childless, to get his nephew, Bogislaus of Pomerania, appointed as his successor brought affairs to a crisis. The com- mandant at Stockholm had received orders to admit the young prince into the fortress, that the garrison might swear him allegiance. The inhabitants, in- formed of the project, secretly invited Engelbrect to make himself master of the place. The commandant at his approach shut the gates, and drew up the bridges ; but the inhabitants hewed them down, and the garrison was compelled to retreat to the citadel, which was besieged by Eric Puke on one side, and Charles Knutson on the other. 2 A new election for the regency now took place : thirty nobles were appointed the electors. There were three competitors, Engelbrect, Eric Puke, and 1 Erioi Olai, p. 135 ; Eimohronica, p. 218. ' Brici Olai, p. 137. Chap. I. MURDER OF ENGELBRECT. 1 1 Knutson. If personal merit, or past services and successes, or the popular wish had determined the choice of the electors, it would have fallen upon En- gelbrect. But his birth and favour with the people were both obstacles to him with a committee alto- gether aristocratically composed. One of his an- tagonists, Knutson, moreover, combined many natural and adventitious recommendations which made him a formidable opponent. He was tall, and of a mas- culine beauty, sagacious and subtle, prudent in speech, and captivating in his address. Besides all this, he was of high birth and the richest man of his time — points which weighed more, probably, with the electors than all the rest. He was elected by a large majority, the votes being on his side twenty-five, for Engelbrect three, and for Puke two. 1 This result was alike unsatisfactory to Engel- brect, to Eric Puke, and the people. A com- promise was at last effected. The command of the army in the country was given to Engelbrect ; the management of affairs in the capital was retained by Knutson. 2 A deed of treachery and bloodshed soon terminated this division of power. While returning from an expedition against the Danish border, Engelbrect was taken ill and brought sick to Orebro. In the neighbourhood of this town dwelt a powerful noble- man, an adherent of King Eric, named Bennet Stenson (Natt och Dag) ; there had been a feud 1 Olai Petri, p. 291. s Ibid. 12 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. between Engelbrect and himself, which the latter now sought at a personal interview to terminate. Engel- brect received him with courtesy, and after having agreed to refer their quarrel to the council, resolved, at Stenson's suggestion, it is said, to return to Stock- holm by water, being still too weak to travel on horseback. He embarked accordingly on the Lake Hjelmar, himself, his wife, and a few attendants, and passing by Goksholm castle, Stenson's abode, stopped for the night at a small island not far distant. Soon after a boat was seen approaching : Engelbrect who, supposed that it brought an invitation from his newly reconciled enemy, pointed out a suitable landing- place, and tottered towards it, leaning on his crutch. Out rushed from the boat a son of Stenson's, Magnus Bengtson, who asked him roughly whether through him he was never to have peace in the land. Upon his answer, that he knew of no strife between them, Bengtson struck at him with a hatchet, and the blow, which Engelbrect parried with his crutch, cut off three of his fingers. A second and third blow on the head and neck stretched him on the ground. The savage murderer, having first sent several arrows into the dead body, left his victim weltering in his blood, and carried off his wife and attendants to the neigh- bouring castle. This atrocious deed took place on the 27th Of April, 1436; and thus perished one whose bravery and military talents, whose humanity and genuine patriotism secured him friends and ad- mirers even in a class which for the most part en- Chap. I. REGENCY OP CHARLES KNUTSON. 13 vied his success and opposed his advancement, while by the people he was honoured while living as the hero, and revered in death as the martyr of their cause ; the popular belief running to the length of crediting that miracles were wrought at his tomb in Orebro, whither his remains, after having been buried by the peasants at Mallosa, were ultimately conveyed. 1 The servants of. Engelbrect and the people, having vainly attempted to storm Goksholm castle, were forced to content themselves with burning down the wooden buildings which lay without the walls. On the other hand, the Regent issued a proclamation forbidding any one to injure the murderer, and thus created or confirmed the suspicion that what had taken place had been done with his approbation at least, if not with his previous concurrence. 2 After the death of Engelbrect, Knutson contrived to get rid of his more formidable rivals, who were so imprudent as to give him at once both a plausible pretext and a convenient occasion. Thus Broder Swenson in 1436, and Eric Puke in 1437, were put to death by his order. The Biksdrots, Christopher Nilson, was surprised at his country-seat, and sent to Vibourg castle, in Finland, in 1439. The new Biksmarsk, Nicholas Stenson, who had plotted with 1 Erici Olai, p. 139 ; Rim. Chronica, p. 241. " Engelbrect qui tribus annis regnavit et postea interfectus est per quendam nobilem Magnum Bengston, sed modo, prout dicitur, plurimis coruscat mira- culis in ecclesia Orebro qua est sepultus." — Diar. Vadst., p. 151. a Erici Olai, p. 139. 14 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. him to bring back the King, fled to Gothland, where Eric, in the society of his mistress, and sharing the spoils with pirates, consoled himself for the loss of a throne which his own misconduct no less than the difficulties of his position had made first uneasy and then untenable. 1 The Church, headed by the Archbishop of Upsala, and party rivalries, had been the chief means of pre- serving entire the slender bonds of allegiance which the faults and indifference of the King constantly threatened with dissolution. It was thus that his claims and title were continually set up and played against the substantial power of him who wielded his authority. Within five years from the breaking out of Engelbrect's insurrection, ten congresses for the redress of grievances, and for the confirmation of the union, were held at different places and under different names. The game perhaps might still have gone on, but the King himself was weary of it. Sweden therefore, following the example of Den- mark, finally renounced his allegiance in the year 1439. He still continued to live for ten years in Gothland, and when compelled to quit it, ten years after, fled to Riigenwalde in Pomerania, where he died in the year 1459, aged 76, in obscurity and contempt. 2 1 Erici Olai, p. 142. Nicholas Stenson was brother-in-law to Knutson. Beturning from Gothland with a body of 200 men, he was defeated and captured, and died three days after at Norisoping. — lb. " Eex in Gotlandiam festinavit et pirata factus ex rege multo tempore latrocinia exercens regnum Sueorum gravissime affligebat." — lb. 144. s Erici Olai, p. 143 ; Geijer, i. 234. Chap. I. KNUTSON CHOSEN KING. 15 Christopher the Third, who succeeded Eric in the throne of Denmark, and whose claim to that of Sweden was with some difficulty acknowledged, reigned eight years. After his death Charles Knut- son succeeded in procuring his own election to the Swedish Crown, and was proclaimed at Mora, in the year 1448. The Danes on their side, after the death of Christopher, chose as his successor Christian the First, of «the house of Oldenburg, and a descend- ant of Hakan, King of Norway. In this choice the Norwegians concurred, and Christian now only waited for an opportunity of recovering the Crown of Sweden from the hands of the powerful subject who had grasped it. 1 It is not my intention to dwell upon the various struggles and negotiations of the rival Kings, nor to enter into much detail of the events of this period. Suffice it to notice that the first cannon used as field- pieces in Sweden, to the number of twenty, mounted on sledges, and loaded with bullets of stone, were employed by Charles in his attack upon Scania in the year 1452 ; 2 and that the war which was waged for some years with fluctuating success, towards 1456 began to turn against the Swedish King. He had neither courage nor military skill, so as to keep his own with an inferior force, or to use superior num- bers to the best advantage. 3 By distrusting his 1 Brici Olai, pp. 155, 157. 2 Rimcliroiiica, p. 411. 8 " In rebus bellicis minus quam tali officio expediebat instructus, meticulosus, et timidus." — Erici Olai, p. 159. 16 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap, I. nobles he had multiplied his enemies in that order. His attack on the privileges and possessions of the Church, by the celebrated inquest of 1454, had "stirred up against him a power with which he had not strength, to grapple. Even the commons, with whom a native King was especially popular, had grown weary of the heavy taxations by which they were impoverished, of the conscriptions by which they were continually interrupted in their agricultural labours, and of the oppressions of the lieutenants, who, in the King's name, and under cover of the law, pillaged all who came within their reach. 1 At this period of declining influence Christian marched into Sweden, armed with a bull from the Pope, com- manding Charles to give up Nerike and Vermanland, the dowry of the Danish Queen. The Archbishop, John Bengtsson, of the powerful family of the Oxenstjernas, was already in arms against him. An engagement took place at Strengness, where Charles was wounded. From thence he fled to Stockholm, but, finding his position in the capital insecure, and unable to make an accommodation with the Arch- bishop, he passed over to Dantzic in 1457, thus ter- minating for a while a ten years' contest, and leaving the throne open to his rival. 2 Christian being now chosen king, was crowned at Upsala the 29th of June, 1457 : in the following year the succession was secured to his son. The early popularity of his reign was soon changed into • Erioi Olai, p. 160. a lb., p. 162. Chap. 1. KNUTSON'S ABDICATION AND RECALL. 17 universal discontent by the sums which he levied to buy off his brothers' joint interest in the duchy of Holstein. Suspecting the Archbishop of fostering this discontent, he carried him to Denmark, and detained him there for a while (as he himself informed the Pope) in honourable captivity. 1 The King was no sooner gone than Kettil Carlson (Vasa), Bishop of Linkoping and cousin to the cap- tive prelate, took arms to avenge him. Coming over in mid-winter to suppress the tumult, Christian was hemmed in by the Dalesmen near Haraker in Vest- manland, and experienced a decisive defeat. Knut- son was now recalled, but expelled again after six months by the Archbishop, who had been reconciled to Christian, released from prison, and joined by the Bishop of Linkoping. 2 Charles remained in Finland from January, 1464, to November, 1467, in such poverty that he had not the means of paying a debt of forty marks. But shortly after his last recall, in 1467, which was occasioned by the victory of the 1 Olai Petri, p. 305. The King excuses himself in a letter to Pope Pius II., dated the Feast of St. Bartholomew, 1463. Afterimputing to the Archbishop the greatest treachery and cruelty, he adds, — " Ex praanissis et aliis gravissimis causis dictum Archiepiscopum ne graviora mihi et singulis incolis regnorum meorum commoveat, de maturo et deliberato consilio honestae custodia? ad tempus duxi deputandum ; non intendens per hoc ecclesiee, ut regem decet Catholicum, aliquod afferre detrimentum." — Script. Eerum Danicarum, vol. vii. p. 417. a The King's letters of reconciliation with the Archbishop and with Bishop Kettil Carlson are given in the Appendix to the Rimchronica, ed. Hadorph, pp. 228, 229. Both held the regency : the Archbishop in 1457, 1465, and 1466, the Bishop in 1464 ; the Archbishop being- deposed in the autumn of 1466, Eric Axelson (Tott) was chosen in his stead. — Olai Petri, p. 316. C 18 GUST AVU8 V ASA. Chap. I. Stures over the Danes at Vesteras, his old enemy the Archbishop, who had fled after that victory, died in exile. Other victories on the part of the Stures, at Fahlun, at Oppoga Ferry, and at Tiveden Forest, assured his possession of the throne until his death, which took place at Stockholm on the 15th May, 1470, in his 62nd year, after a reign which was (says Olaus Petri) " little better than one continued tumult and civil war." 1 Sten (Stephen) Sture, called the Elder — whom his uncle on his deathbed advised never to seek the crown — was the son of Gustaf Sture, by Brita Bjelke, half-sister to King Charles. His first cam- paign was made in 1464 against Christian, under the Bishop of Linkoping : he afterwards served with great distinction under his namesake Nils (Nicholas) Sture. He was chosen Regent at Arboga on the 1st May, 1471, chiefly through the peasants and burgh- ers, but also with the consent of a majority of the nobles. 2 On the other hand, Christian was proclaimed king in different parts of the kingdom ; many flocked to his banner. He himself having laid siege to Stock- holm at the head of a considerable force, the Stures marched to its relief, and on the 11th October, 1471, the celebrated battle of Brunkeberg took place. 3 Brunkeberg, now levelled and built over, was then a ridge of sand without the city of Stockholm. The 1 Geijer, i. 251 ; Olai Petri, 319. a See Appendix. 8 Olai Petri, 321. Chap. I. BATTLE OF BBUNKEBERG. 19 King had thrown up upon it a wooden fort protected with large guns to cover his troops in the event of a sally. To the north of the fort the King was posted with one division of his army ; another division, the left wing, was stationed at the convent of St. Clara ; a third was with the fleet at the little island now called Blasii-holmen. Across the stream, which then sepa- rated the island from the north suburb (Norrmalm), the Danes had thrown a bridge to keep up the com- munication with the fleet. 1 The Swedish army — which was also composed of three divisions — having first prayed and confessed, marched to the attack singing for a war-song the visa of St. George, and wearing boughs and straws in their bonnets and helmets, to distinguish their own men from those of the same provinces in the ranks of the enemy. One division under Nils Sture was de- tached to march by a circuitous route and fall upon the Danish left wing, but met with so many impedi- ments of wood and rock in executing the manoeuvre as scarcelv to arrive in time to save the battle. Sten Sture himself, with the two remaining divi- sions, marched against the King, and was supported by Knut Posse with a force of 2000 men, brought out from the town in boats, who burnt the fort, while Sture charged the division, which the King personally commanded, but without success. In a second charge 1 The division at St. Clara is sometimes called the right wing, Christian's army being considered as besieging Stockholm, and not as defending itself against Sture. c 2 20 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. the Regent succeeded in planting his standard on the summit of the hill, but could not maintain his advan- tage ; he charged a third time, and was once more driven back. But now Knut Posse fell upon the division stationed at St. Clara, and, Sten Sture second- ing this movement by directing his forces to the same point, the Danes on the hill abandoned their advan- tageous post in order to save their comrades. The battle was still obstinately contended : at length the Swedes seemed to lose ground, when the arrival of Nils Sture changed the complexion of affairs, and the Danes were put to flight. In the battle, which lasted from eleven till two, the King was struck with a bullet, which broke three of his front teeth ; he himself wounded Possfe, the leader of the sally, with his own hand. The Regent's wife and the ladies of the court watched the contest from the citadel. A peasant, whose sobriquet was Starke Bjorn (Strong Bear), kept in front of Sten Sture's horse during the battle, and with a huge sword cleared. the way before him. The King escaped with difficulty to the fleet ; many in attempting to reach it were drowned, the townspeople of Stockholm having during the engagement sawn through the bridge which led to the island. An old Danish writer in- forms us that some threw themselves into the water under the witcheries of one Dr. Ryling, Proconsul at Stockholm ;' but it may well be doubted whether any 1 Upon which Johannes Magnus — " Dani retulerant earn adversam belli fortunam sibi non tarn viribus Sueonum quam magicis artibus Chap. I. DEATH OF CHRISTIAN. 21 wands or enchantments were employed so potent as the swords of the enemy and their shouts in pursuit. The loss of the Danes is stated to have been from 700 to 900 drowned, besides those slain on the field, and 900 prisoners. 1 The Swedes of Christian's army who gained the ships encountered there a fresh peril. The Danes, attributing their defeat to treachery, would have thrown them overboard had not the King prevented it. He himself quitted Sweden for ever, and left it to enjoy during the remaining ten years of his life a degree of peace and prosperity to which it had been long a stranger. 2 Thus virtually ended in that kingdom the reign oi a prince whom the Danes reckon among the best of their monarchs, and who would fain have secured the happiness of all parts of his dominions, but "who shares in Sweden," says Geijer, "the unpopularity of the union, and whose memory is blended with the evils, which that measure brought in its train." "In person he was strong, tall, and well made, in dispo- sition pious and God-fearing, kind and moderate," 3 cujusdam Doctoris Eyllingi proconsulis Stockholmensis obvenisse, quasi nulla alia ratione summam illorum ignaviam, qui se sponte submerserint, excusare potuissent." — Lib. 23, 9. 1 There is the usual circumstantial variety in the account of this battle as given in the Rimchronica (by an eye-witness) by Olaus and Laurentius Petri and others. I have given the account which, upon a comparison of several both ancient and modern authors, seems to me most probable. . 2 Geijer, vol. i. p. 260. 3 Hvitfeldt. 22 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. brave in war, but delighting in peace, with a courage that never degenerated into ferocity, and a piety which was at once fervent and, for that age, free from superstition. He died on the 22nd May, 1481, aged 55, and was buried in the cathedral of Roskild. 1 Though after the battle of Brunkeberg negotiations had been frequently set on foot for the re-establish- ment of the union, they produced no tangible result until 1483, when atCalmar the treaty was once more renewed, and John, the son of Christian, declared King of the three kingdoms. Some rather one-sided conditions, and others suffi- ciently stringent, are found in the 51 articles of which the treaty consists. The King was to pay all his father's debts in the three kingdoms, and yet was to remit all claims for arrears in respect to his mother's dowry. Neither he nor his wife nor children were to buy or take in mortgage any noble fief: on the contrary, the nobles might hold fiefs from the crown without fine or service, might fortify their castles, might refuse entrance to the King himself, and even give free harbourage to those who should fall under his displeasure, providing only they were willing to stand their trial before the State Council, and were not lawfully proscribed or condemned. No new taxes were to be levied nor war to be made with- 1 Princeps humanissimue, et qui praater profusionem suarum reram non haberet quod in eo carperetur. — Petri Olai, Script. Ber. Dan., vol. i. p. 146. Portitudine, armis, et viotoriis potens, gloria et magnifioentia dives, fide vero ac religione pius. — Ohron. Skibyense Best; Script. Eer. Dan., vol. ii. p. 559. Chap. I. TREATY WITH KING JOHN. 23 out the consent of the States ; no troops to be quar- tered upon bishops, monasteries, or tenants in capite of the crown; none of the King's servants to be maintained at the expense of the towns and cities except the King should be with them ; no foreigners to have command or authority in the kingdom ; and all the privileges of the church to be confirmed — provisions which, hard as they were upon the King, it was natural enough for those to make who had formerly suffered from a stretch of royal authority, and who, after a successful contest, had enjoyed that authority too long to lay it willingly aside. 1 It is ob- servable, however, that the commons, who had borne the chief part in obtaining the victory, had the smallest share of its spoils, and that, by an express provision of the treaty, no noble fief could be pur- chased by any one, who was not a nobleman. Many years elapsed before John actually came to Denmark, " partly because he was unable to pay his father's debts, and partly because the Swedes did not care to have him." 2 But the loss of the greatest army that Sweden had ever sent out of the kingdom, in the war against Russia in 1495, and the fruitless operations of a fresh army sent against the same power in the following year, the Regent's neglect to fill up the vacancies in the State Council, his reluctance to carry out the treaty of Calmar of 1483, and his policy of relying 1 Appendix to Eimcnronica, Hadorph, p. 318. 8 Geijer, after Olaus Petri. 24 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. upon the people rather than the aristocracy, produced such dissatisfaction that the Council, in 1497, invited King John to come over and occupy the throne. 1 He obeyed the summons at the head of an army, which he posted on the formerly unfortunate field of Brunkeberg. According to the plan of Sture, who held Stockholm, the Dalesmen were to attack the King in front, while he made a sally in the rear — in other words, the tactics of the former field were to be repeated. But John obtained intelligence and pre- vented the execution of this scheme of placing him between two fires. Marching out to meet the Dales- men, he defeated them at Bbtebro, to the number, according to Danish accounts, of 30,000 ; returning thence he fell upon and destroyed the force com- manded by the Begent, who himself narrowly escaped capture, having been obliged to swim across the Norrstrbm on horseback, and to re-enter the town through a sallyport. 2 An accommodation was now brought about be- tween himself and the King,, and they entered arm in arm into Stockholm. The King was crowned on the 25th November, 1497; Sten Sture appointed Bikshofmastere (High Steward), Swante Sture Biks- marsk, and the former one of the four councillors upon whom the government devolved when the King, in the following January, returned to Den- 1 Olai Petri, p. 330 ; Geijer, i. 267. s Bimchronica, pp. 518, 519 ; Geijer, i. 268. This was on the 28th October, 1497. Chap. I. REVOLT OP THE NOBLES. 25 mark. He came back again the next year with his son Christian, then about seventeen, who was pro- claimed his successor. 1 The nobles did not long continue satisfied with the King; and when, after the unfortunate battle near Meldorp in the Ditmarches, 17th February, 1500, where the flower of Denmark's and Holstein's armies were defeated by peasants, he returned to Sweden, the discontent was openly manifested. Some fruit- less negotiations took place: the State Council ac- cused the King of not having kept the conditions of Calmar recess ; of having appointed Danish com- mandants and lieutenants to the fortresses of the kingdom; of not having repaid some of the State Council the damage they had sustained ; of having carried gold and silver out of the kingdom, &c. They therefore renounced their fealty to him, and again chose Sten Stare Regent on the 11th Novem- ber, 1501. 2 The King had left to his Queen, Christina, the defence of Stockholm, which was besieged by Hem- ming Gadd, Bishop (elect) of Linkbping, with a promise of returning to her relief. The town soon capitulated, but the citadel held out for eight months; and when at last surrendered by the Queen upon condition of safety to the goods and persons of her- self and followers, there were found, out of a garrison of 1000 men, 70 only living, and of these no more 1 Laurentii Petri, p. 138, Soon after Easter, 1499. B Olai Petri, p. 333. 26 GTJSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. than ten in health. Three days after the surrender the King arrived, but, finding he had come too late, returned to Denmark. The Queen was permitted to retire to the convent of Vadstena. Half a year after she was released and conducted to the frontier by the Regent, who, on his return, sickened and died at Ionkoping the 13th December, 1503, not without suspicion of having been poisoned. 1 During a considerable portion of the regency of Sten Sture the Elder, Sweden enjoyed a greater degree of prosperity than at any other period of the union. His policy and his praise are at once com- prised in what King John uttered against him as a reproach, that "he had made the nobles serfs, and the serfs nobles." 2 For this, being justly interpreted, meant no more than that he had in some measure curbed the encroachments of the nobles, and pro- tected the rights of the commons. His devotion and liberality secured him the support of the ecclesiastics, his justice and sympathy that of the common people ; and with these two orders combined in his favour, he had a force sufficient to keep the third in check, and, in the absence of enemies from without, to secure to the kingdom internal tranquillity. Sweden was in- debted to him for the introduction of the printing- press, and the first foundation of the University of Upsala, which however during the succeeding troubles fell into decay. He was buried in the 1 Olai Petri, p. 334 ; Laurentii Petri, p. 139. 2 Olai Petri, p. 332. Chap. I. STURE'S DEATH— HIS SUCCESSORS. 27 monastery of Gripsholm, which he founded. His only son had died in 1493. 1 Swante Stare', son of the late Nils Sture, a frank, brave soldier, was chosen successor to the deceased Regent, through the stratagem and influence of Hemming Gadd, who vir- tually shared with him the regency, and kept the kingdom in a perpetual feud with Denmark until his (the Eegent's) death, which took place at Ves- teras, when the subject of a newly-discovered silver- mine was under discussion, and had called forth more than usual interest and excitement. In this case also, as in all other instances of sudden death in that age, poison was suspected. After his death the regency was contested by his son Sten Sture the Younger and Eric Trolle. The first, who was of a noble character, and popular both with the people and the younger nobility, was at last elected ; but the passions which had been called forth by the contest did not terminate "with it. At the entertainment given in Stockholm Castle to celebrate the election, Eric Abrahamson Lejonhufvud stabbed, so as to endanger his life, a nobleman of the opposite faction, and Gustavus Trolle, though raised to the bishopric of Upsala by the influence of the Regent, never forgave him his success. 8 1 Olai Petri, p. 337 ; Rimchronica. 2 Olai Petri, p. 336. Sed durior erat in Archiepiscopo animus, quam quod permitteret sibi aliquant conoordiam persuaderi cum Stenone, qui patrem Ericum a tarn amplo principatu seclusisset, spemque maximam in Danorum rege Christierno se reponere ostendetat. • — Job. Magni, lib. 24, p. 1. 28 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. King John died on the 21st of February, 1513, in the 58th year of his age and the 32nd of his reign — his death having been accelerated by a fall from his horse. He was with reason regretted as a generally just and humane prince, an enemy to all display, and distinguished in his own court chiefly by the modesty of his demeanour. He was subject, however, to attacks of melancholy and suspicion, under the influence of which he hanged his ac- countant-general, whom he had raised from obscurity, and connived at the murder of Laxmand, the Grand Master of the kingdom. 1 His son and successor, Christian the Second, in- herited the darker traits, but not the virtues, of his father's character. A war, promoted and conducted by Gustavus Trolle, put an end, in 1516, to the negotiations which were carried on from time to time with a view to procuring the new King's ac- knowledgment in Sweden ; and it was while serving under the Eegent, against the Archbishop, that Gus- tavus Vasa first drew his sword in a cause which early feelings and prejudices, the cruelties already per- petrated by Christian in Norway, and possibly an in- cipient ambition, made precious and sacred in his sight. 1 Olai Petri, p. 337 ; Mallet, Histoire de Dannemarc, liv. 6, p. 380 The Chronicon Skibyense acquits him, apparently, of connivance at the murder, when enumerating the worst points of his character : " Quod si Bex iste conjugii fidem servasset temperassetque a bello et sanguine, in quo tamen casu magis quam proposito inciderat, ahstinuissetque etiam ab iniqua sententia quam decemehat contra heredes Pauli Laxmand Magistri Equitum, fuisset Princeps sane et optimus et felicissimus." — Per. Dan. Scrip., vol. ii. p. 564. Chap. I. DIFFICULTIES OF SWEDISH RULERS. 29 It is by no means certain that, had the Danish Kings of the Union adhered to the treaty of Calmar as religiously as some of them notoriously violated it, it would have been an easy thing to maintain content and tranquillity in Sweden. In the first place, there existed, in the oppressions and pretensions of the nobles, and in their mutual rivalries, constant ele- ments of discord. Their attempts to assert the dis- tinctions of caste, and to close the path of honour to a free-born and high-spirited people, was to enlist against them the enmity of the latter, which was ready on every provocation, at the bidding of the patriotic or the ambitious among the nobles them- selves, to break out into open hostility. Other causes of disquiet were ever more or less at work in the wealth and privileges of the clergy, and, combined with these, in the poverty of the people, who, fre- quently visited with short harvests, and having only slender resources from commerce, bore the ordinary burthens of the state with difficulty, and every extra call with a pain proportionate to the pressure. It was not that the imposts, with reference to the exigencies of the state, were always too much to ask, but that, with reference to the means of the people, they were almost always too much to pay. Although therefore the enthusiasm of a popular cause might for a while induce them to bear extraordinary bur- , thens without a murmur, the result of a continued pressure was invariably discontent. The officers charged with the collection of the 30 G-USTAVUS VASA. Chap. I. revenue had an arduous task under such circum- stances. Compelled by their duty to punish the frauds by which their demands were evaded, or the violence by which they were defied, they stirred up against themselves an animosity which they generally learned to reciprocate, and which often led them, even when not originally so inclined, to harshness and oppression. When this state of things occurred under a foreign king and under foreign lieutenants, it created, of course, a more undivided hostility against the govern- ment, as was evident in the insurrection of Engel- brect ; but -Charles Knutson also found by dear-bought experience that even the prestige' of a native king, employing only native officers, could not avail to prevent rebellion when those officers were required to collect much out of a slender store. If the obvious expedient of taxing the untaxed were attempted to replenish the state's exhausted coffers, it was to provoke an order whose wealth already equalled all the revenues of the Crown — an order with whom the learning and intelligence of the times was, in a great degree, deposited, and which was strong alike in the affection and in the supersti- tion of the people. Charles Knutson had seen that a blow aimed at the Church was apt to recoil with stunning force upon the man who dealt it ; while, on the other hand, the Church made it sufficiently appa- rent throughout the Union that its favour would cling to the Prince, native or foreign, patriotic or Chap. I. MISSION OF GUSTAVUS. 3 1 tyrant, who would heap upon it the amplest honours, and enrich it with the largest possessions. Every fief, however, granted to the Church, by lessening .the taxable area of the country or the amount of available military service, increased the State's financial difficulties, and pro tanto the dis- loyalty and discontent which these engendered ; and the warlike prelates of the time were no less ready than the more powerful of the secular nobles to take advantage of the discontent to avenge their own wrongs, to establish their own independence, or to gratify their own ambition. To reduce this chaos into order and permanent obedience to one presiding head, whose interests should be bound up with those of Sweden, was the mission destined for Gustavus. Of the complicated means by which it was to be effected, of the ruin of that great establishment by the dust of whose fall the conflicting elements were partly to be tranquillized, of the pinnacle to which it was to exalt himself, he could have had, when he first girded on his sword, not the slightest conjecture ; but of the mission itself it is probable that he had then, and even before, an instinctive dream. 32 GUSTAYUS VASA. Chap. II. CHAPTER II. Ancestry of Gustavus — His birth and childhood — Eeceived at the court of Sten Stare 1 — The Archbishop before the States — Battle of Briinkyrka — Treachery of the King — Gustavus prisoner in Denmark — Escapes to Lubeck — His wanderings — Death of the Begent — Battle with the peasants — Stockholm surrendered — The coronation — Didrik Slaghec's counsel — The King's continued perjuries — Massacre in the capital. Gustavus Yasa, or, as he was called before he be- came King, Gustavus Erikson — patronymics being at that time generally used in Sweden, even among the nobility, instead of family names — was descended from an ancient and distinguished race, which, two hundred years before, had given members to the State Council. He himself was jealous of the fame of his ancestors, and took delight in representing his elevation to the throne as a restoration of the royal lines of Magnus Ladulas and Charles Knutson. The name of Vasa, derived by some from Vasa-gard in Upland, arose probably, like that of Lejonhufvud (Lion-head), Swinhufvud (Boar-head), and many others, from the device on the family escutcheon. The device represented originally either a fascine or a sheaf ; and as the colour was then black and the age almost exclusively warlike, the first appears the preferable conjecture, though, when in 1540 Gustavus Chap. II. HIS BIRTH AND ANCESTRY. 33 changed the colour to gold, he seems to have put the peaceful interpretation upon the ambiguous em- blem. 1 The great-grandfather of Gustavus was the Chris- topher Nilson who was made Riksdrots by Eric of Pomerania. His father, Eric Johanson, was a mem- ber of the State Council ; and his mother, Cecilia- til-Eka, half-sister to Christina Gyllenstjerna, the wife of the younger Sten Sture. He was born at Lindholm, in Eoslagen, a place then belonging to his grandmother, Sigrid Baner, twenty-one miles from Stockholm. The year of his birth is variously given by ancient writers, and even by his own contempo- rary relations, the dates varying from 1488 to 1497. 2 Geijer has fixed his birth in the year 1496, because Gustavus is known to have been born "on the 12th May, which was also Ascension-day," and of all the disputed years it is only in 1496 that the festival falls on that day of the month. Several collateral circumstances, especially the dates of his going to school and leaving it, confirm this conjecture. 3 The ladies who were present on the auspicious occasion saw, or fancied they saw, in the newborn infant presages of his future greatness. On his head there was a caul, which appeared to them, as it were, 1 Ziervogel contends that the device always represented a cornsheaf, " fascis segetum colligatus." — Usus Rei Nummari*, pt. 3, p. 182. 2 Tegel gives the date 1490, which later writers have generally -followed, " King Charles the Ninth makes his father two years older, and his nephew, Peter Brahe', five years younger." — Geijer, vol. ii. p. 5. 3 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 5. D 34 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IT. a helmet, on his bosom a crimson cross. He was named Gustavus after his maternal grandfather. 1 When he was four years old, King John$ on one of his last visits to Sweden, observing the boy at play with some of his companions, prophesied that he would one day be "a man," and proposed taking him to Denmark. But Sten Sture, suspecting that the offer was made rather that the King might have a pledge of his fidelity than for Gustavus's advantage, declined it on the ground of the child's tender years, and sent him home to his father, that he might be freed from importunities, which, without betraying suspicion, it might have been difficult to resist. 8 In the year 1509 he was sent to school at Upsala, under one Master Ivar, a Dane, whom Gustavus hated both for his nation and his severity. He came in for his share of the latter in the shape of corporal punishment, an indignity which the " Vasa blood " angrily resented ; and, Ivar having one day spoken contemptuously of the Swedes, Gustavus is said to have drawn out his sword, thrust it through the book they were reading, and quitted the school to return no more. 3 1 Peter Brahe ap. Celsium. " Gustavus in aree nascitur Lind- holmensi 12 Mail (1490) galeam in capite membraneam et rubicundam in pectore crucem de utero proferens materno bisque palam faciens prodigiis in quantum evasurus esset heroem." — Messenii Scondia Illustrata, torn. iv. p. 47. 8 Tegel, vol. i. p. 3. Dalin quotes a saying attributed to John on the occasion " that the young wolf had escaped his toils." — Vol.' iii. p. 4. a Tegel, vol. i. p. 3 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 26 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 6. Chap. II. HIS SCHOOL-DAYS. 35 While he was at Upsala, canon-law, theology, and music were his chief studies. He himself made there musical instruments of different kinds, which he kept afterwards in a separate room of Stockholm castle as memorials of his boyish ingenuity. His favourite haunts in the neighbourhood of Upsala are still upon record, and it was there that, under the bright blue sky and exhilarating influences of a northern winter, he mingled in the wolfskall, and in the other manly sports of his gallant nation. 1 He used to dress, in his school-days, in a scarlet frock of English manufacture, and was at that time remarkable for his cheerful and amiable, though somewhat hasty disposition, for his ready eloquence, for his tenacious memory, and for a patience in coun- sel so happily blended with decision, that his projects were never prematurely attempted, nor deferred after they were ripe for execution. 2 • All accounts agree that he was received at the Court of Sten Sture' the younger in the year 1514. He was then eighteen ; and here he was placed under the quasi-tuition of Hemming Gadd, who had been Mathematicus to Pope Alexander the Third, written a history of Sweden which was much prized, who was a sworn enemy to the Danes, and an able though ruse politician. The instructions of this man, to- wards whom Gustavus was drawn by admiration and 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. 27. For a description of the wolfskall see Lloyd's ' Northern Field Sports,' vol. ii. p. 202. 2 Celsius, ib. D 2 ,'W mvr.vvrs yas-v, o«\<\ u political sympathy, had a sousd>lo and not always a beneficial influence upon his character.* A Danish reinforcement having boon sent to re- lieve (. be ranted to the ground. The chief members of the assembly were compelled to atfix their seals to the decree. Tin" President, how- ever, John Brask, Bishop of liinkoping, took the precaution to place under his seal a paper to tho ■ lino aium slmllis vatt>itloviw ml lllkiK (KIoihuiM m iHintulll miluui In qua (tin omii lli'iimilimti UmMlo i'iuivomiIuk iuHigticiu I't'Vtiiu i>\ pOTloillllUII ai'l|lll«lvU." Sl'IMIll. Illtmt,, Inm. Iv. |i, V.'l ! I VUlim, Vol. I l>. 28. * ticijw iimilvtM'lt'iittv nay* Ai-lm^i : tail l«>lli Olwtw mill l.nmitilin. Chap. II. I WITH UK OK NTKKKimitU. 37 effect that his consent, had been extorted. This "bit of Romanism," as tin 1 evangelical Olaus Petri calls it., atVerwards saved his life.' In the mean time the Archbishop returned to his enstle, but being hard pressed by the Regent was compelled to surrender. Stekcborg was then levelled to the ground by the populace, from whose hands the prelate himself was with difficulty rescued. The conditions imposed upon him were such as fear and vengeance dictated. I le was compelled by a formal act to renounce his archbishopric and swear never to reclaim it, and to retire to the monastery of Ves- teriis, where, according to Messenius, he was person- ally ill-treated." They who took part in this triumph little knew with what vengeance it was to be repaid. Still less could (Just.avus anticipate the manner in which it was to affect his future destiny, and that it was to lead him not through successive triumphs, but through perils, sorrows, and humiliations to a throne ! On St. Magdalen's day, 1518, the following year, the battle of Urankyrka took place between the King and Sten Sture. After this battle, in which (xiistavus bore the Swedish chief banner and was honourably distinguished, the Danes, who were defeated and lost 300 prisoners, resolved to retreat. But the wind was contrary, and the fleet was sorely pressed by 1 oixi ivi.ri, pp. :i:i!i, mo. * Olid IVlri, p. MO ; 800ml. lllusl., I, mi. iv. p, Til. 38 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. famine. The King, to gain time and supplies, com- menced negotiations for a peace, pending which the Regent furnished the squadron with oxen and other provisions. Convinced now of. the generous cha- racter of his enemy, the King invited him to a per- sonal conference on board his ship, and Sture would have fallen into the snare thus spread for him, had not the town council of Stockholm declared that if he went on board they would soon have another Regent, for they were sure he would never come back. Foiled in this project, the King professed his readiness to come on shore himself, provided suitable hostages were sent to the squadron. This being agreed to, six nobles were chosen for the purpose — Gustavus Erickson, Hemming Gadd, Lars Siggeson (of the Sparre family), and three others ; but the boat which was to convey them on board had not accom- plished half the passage when a Danish ship with 100 men on board cut them off, and carried them to the fleet as prisoners. A favourable breeze springing up took away all hope of rescue. The ships weighed anchor, the sails filled, and they were soon landed on the coast of Denmark.' It was the good fortune of Gustavus to be com- mitted to the care of a relation, Eric Baner, living at the castle of Kallo in North Jutland, who became bound to the King in the sum of 6000 dollars for 1 Olai Petri, p. 340. The names of the hostages were given in Christian's safe-conduct. — Tegel, vol. i. p. 5. Chap. II. HIS CAPTIVITY IN DENMARK. 39 his safe custody. Here he was put upon his parole, and suffered none of the rigors of captivity. But a tempest was gathering over Sweden, and sounds of the coining storm soon reached his ears. At the in- stance of Gustavus Trolle, Sten Sture and his adhe- rents had been excommunicated, and the kingdom laid under an interdict. This was not all. An im- mense armament was in preparation against the Swedes ; Copenhagen was filled with English, Scotch, French, and German troops ; new taxes were levied, money raised everywhere, and by all means, to meet the expenses of the expedition. The campaign was fixed for 1520, and was to open in the winter, that season affording, in Sweden, the greatest facilities for the march and transport of troops and baggage.' At the hall-table Gustavus heard these rumours dis- cussed with triumphant levity. The young soldiers boasted that they would soon play with the Swedes the game of St. Peter, and jestingly parcelled out among themselves the wealth and beauty of the nation. This table-talk was rather an unsavoury condiment to the fare with which Eric Baner regaled his kinsman, and which, consisting, as it did, of salt junk, sour ale, black bread, and rancid herring, was in itself not the most palatable. He resolved to escape, with the hope of reaching Sweden in time to 1 " Winter is not the season which is worst for the Swede. The bridges, which Nature then stretches over the lakes and streams, open communications between remote provinces ; and our severer cold, because it is pure and dry, is not so disagreeable as the less sharp but foggy cold of more southern climates."— Porsell's Statistik, 1844, p. 23. 40 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II, defend his country, or at least of being ready for any favourable juncture which might arise. 1 Early one morning in the autumn of 1519 he left the castle disguised, according to some as a pilgrim, but according to others as a drover, and travelled with such speed that the first day he left forty-two English miles behind him. Passing through Flends- borg he came to Lubeck on the last day of Septem- ber, and threw himself upon the protection of the Burgomaster and Council. 2 As soon as Eric Baner discovered the retreat of Gustavus, he hastened to Lubeck, armed, with a letter from the King, and de- manded back his prisoner. He complained at the same time that Gustavus had effected his escape, contrary to his pledged word as a knight and his obligations as a kinsman. Gustavus spoke in his own defence. " Lwas captured," he said, " contrary to all justice and plighted faith. It is notorious, that I went to the King's fleet as a hostage. Let any one, who can, point out the place where I was made prisoner in battle, or declare the crime for which I deserved chains. Call me not, then, a prisoner, but a man seized upon unjustly, overreached, betrayed'. I am now in a free city, and before a Government renowned for justice, and for befriending the perse- cuted. Shall I then be altogether deceived in the confidence I have reposed in them ? or can breach 1 Tegel, 1519 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 7. 1 Tegel, 1519 ; Hvitfeldt. 12 old Swedish miles = 6 new = 42 English. Geijer, vol. ii, p. 9. Chap. II. ESCAPES TO LUBECK. 4 1 of faith be reasonably objected to me by one, who never himself kept oath or promise? or can it be wondered, that I should free myself from a prison, which I deserved by no fault, except that of trusting the assurances of a king ? The sum of money which the King demands shall, when I reach Sweden, be immediately sent over, for I must not be a loss to Baner, who took me into his house away from the King's watchful severity, and showed me friendship and kindness." ' The 6000 dollars were, in effect, extracted by Christian from poor Baner, and Gustavus had it not in his power, after his return to Sweden, to fulfil his pledge of immediate repayment. After his ele- vation to the throne he positively denied that he was on parole at Kallo. " We were not there" (he writes) "as a prisoner, nor had we given any pledge to remain there, though we find that he (Baner) without any proof says so." 2 There is a difficulty in giving credit to this denial. Not to mention the improbability that Baner should not have secured himself, by the parole of his pri- soner, when he gave him comparative liberty, it is highly improbable that, if no promise had been given, this should not have been pleaded at Lubeck. It was, if true, a complete answer to the only plea on which the Council could, with any show of honour, 1 Peter Brahe; Hist. Gust. MS., apud Celsium, p. 80. s Letter to Magnus Goye, Reg. i. ; Eiks. Arch. 1529, apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 9. 42 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. have withdrawn their protection. Add to this the positive assertion of Hvitfeldt, that " Gustavus pro- mised, in the presence of Sunsee von Millen and many other credible witnesses, that he would remain a pri- soner at Kallo, and not go farther than to church, and to shoot about a mile (Swedish) around the castle," and we must, I think, conclude that Gus- tavus did pass his word to Baner, and, under the smart of the treachery of which he had been the victim, and the pressure of strong temptation, broke it. 1 The shrewd burgesses who listened to the defence of Gustavus were not likely to be misled by his rhetoric, but they would have been of stern stuff indeed, had they not compassionated a fine, spirited young man, the dupe of a faithless tyrant, and not felt reluctant to give him over a second time to his tender mercies. Motives of policy, however, happily told also in Gustavus's favour. Christian, as undisturbed king of the three northern kingdoms, would possess a power which, he had given reason to suspect already, he would not use with moderation nor for the advan- tage of the Hanse Towns ; but if a young nobleman of high birth, fearless character, and first-rate talents, hating him at once with hereditary hate and personal animosity, should, by following • the Engelbrects and Stures, become a thorn in his side and a clog upon his movements, he might perhaps be more manageable. This view of the matter Nils Brom, the burgomaster, ' Hvitfeldt, Christian II., anno 1520, vol. viii. p.lG4. Chap. II. HE SAILS FOR SWEDEN. 43 put forcibly before his colleagues, and so they agreed, instead of giving up Gustavus, to send him back to his own country. " For who knows," said the worthy Council, "what he may do when he gets there P" 1 The doctrines of the Reformation were first heard by Gustavus during his stay at Lubeck, and the impressions then made upon his mind prepared him probably for the distinguished part he afterwards bore in that resurrection of truth and reason. 2 Affairs, however, of a more immediate interest now claimed the chief share of his thoughts. He had heard of Sten Sture's defeat and death, and longed to be once again in Sweden to revive the drooping courage of the patriotic party. Having entered into an engagement with the Lu- beckers to supply him with troops and money, when he should be in a condition to employ them with advantage against Christian, he embarked in the month of May, 1520, in a merchant vessel, bound to Stockholm, with the intention of offering his services to the Eegent's widow, who still gallantly defended that fortress. Unable to carry out this plan, from the capital being invested on all sides, he steered for Calmar, which also still held out against the King. But, the Danish admiral, Severin Norby, lying off the town, he landed at a small headland in the neighbour- hood, and proceeded thither on foot. Cordially wel- comed by the widow of the late commandant, he 1 Tegel, 1519 ; Hvitfeldt ; Dalin, vol. iii. p. 8 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 10. ! Dalin, vol. iii.. chap. i. pp. 8, 9. 44 GUSTAVUS VAS'A. Chap. II. endeavoured, in vain, to breathe some spirit into the inhabitants, and the German garrison answered his "exhortations to continued resistance so roughly that his life was in imminent peril. 1 Finding his presence useless, he left the place on the same day that Norby summoned it to surrender. From Calmar he proceeded to Smaland, amid his father's tenants. Even there he was not safe. This province and East Gothland were so filled with Danes that it was only by a continual change of quarters and disguises that he escaped detection ; and his country- men, when he urged them to rise and shake off the yoke, answered, " Salt and herrings will not fail us so long as we obey the King, but if we rise we are sure of ruin." During the whole summer he was travelling by by-ways, sleeping one night in the woods, the next in the open fields, disguised and persecuted, a price set on his head. In September he appeared, without clothes or money, at the house of his brother-in-law, J. Brahe, whom he could not persuade to disobey the summons which he had received to be present at the approaching coronation. The unhappy man, fearing to bring trouble and sus- picion on his family, and encouraged by the example of other great nobles, set out on the journey which was to be his last. 2 Gustavus meanwhile proceeded to his father's place at Raefhess, where he had frequent communi- 1 Tegel, 1520. 2 Celsius, vol, i. pp. 83, 84 ; Geijer, vol. ii. pp. 11, 12. Chap. II. DEATH OF THE REGENT. 45 cations with the ex- Archbishop, Jacob Ullfson, from whom he received particulars of the late disaster. The Danish army, commanded by General Otto Krumpe, landed in Sweden in the beginning of Jan- uary, 1520. On the 19th Sten Sture met him upon the lake Asund, near Bogesund 1 (in West-Gothland), then hard frozen over. The Regent, who was at the head of his troops, was wounded in the thigh, at the beginning of the battle, and compelled to quit the field ; his whole army was then dispersed or destroyed. The victors marched on to Tiveden, but were there obstructed by a barrier of felled wood, well defended, in attempting to surmount which they suffered severely. A Swedish nobleman, however, Eric Abrahamson (Lejonhufvud), acting as their guide, and enabling them to turn this position, the defenders were overmatched and driven away. 2 The Regent, finding that the barrier at Tiveden had been turned, hastened on to defend Stockholm, but did not live to reach it. After his death none of the nobles would undertake to succeed him in his perilous office, and at a meeting held at Upsala a large proportion submitted to Christian, and received in return an indemnity for past transgressions. The Danes, strong in their arms and discipline, took little account of the peasants, who still from time to time made head against them. " If the skies rained pea- sants," they said, " they would fight them all." The peasants, notwithstanding, assisted by some troops 1 Now Ulricehamn. ! Olai Petri, p. 341. 46 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. from Stockholm, attacked, on Good Friday, the army of the Danes drawn up before Upsala. A snow-storm during the battle prevented the Danes from using their artillery, and their cavalry from acting with effect, for the snow balled under the horses' feet, and both horse and rider continually rolled to the ground. Had the Swedes then had a leader to prevent them from leaving their ranks in search of plunder, the victory might have been com- plete. The Danes confessed, that when they said they would fight with a shower of peasants they had spoken foolishly. "For when God withdraws his hand from the warrior, a poor peasant is as good as he." 1 At Whitsuntide Christian came over with a fleet, and invested Stockholm, at the same time using the mediation of the Bishop of Strengness and Hemming Gadd to procure a surrender. The measure was not popular, and Hemming Gadd was nearly killed by Peter Fredag for proposing it ; but " the chiefs were in its favour, and the rest must needs give in." The terms were a complete oblivion of all past political offences, not only at Stockholm, but throughout the realm, and these terms were ratified by the King in the most solemn manner, no form of law, no sanction of religion being omitted that could inspire confidence in the treaty. When all was finished the burgomas- ters met the King upon the south suburb, presented to him the keys of the city, and then conducted him 1 Olai Petri, p. 343. Chap. II. CORONATION OP CHRISTIAN II. 47 in solemn procession, first to the churches in the town, then to the castle, and finally to the house of one of the citizens, Gorius Hoist, where he remained an inmate. 1 Christian left Sweden after a short time, but returned in the month of October, and summoned all the nobles and dignitaries throughout the kingdom to be at Stockholm on All Saints' day, the 1st of November, to celebrate his coronation. What took place on that memorable occasion Gustavus learnt from one who had escaped from the scene of horrors. 2 The King was proclaimed at the appointed day of meeting, and crowned on the following Sunday, in the High Church of Stockholm, by Archbishop Trolle, assisted by the other bishops. He then con- firmed with fresh oaths all his promises, made at the surrender of the capital, and corroborated them by receiving the sacrament at the high altar. The Bur- gundian herald, who was there on behalf of the Em- peror Charles the Fifth, Christian's brother-in-law, congratulated him in a Latin oration, and invested him with the order of the Golden Fleece. 3 One or two circumstances took place at the cere- mony to awaken the jealousy, if not the suspicion, of the Swedish nobles. Danes and foreigners only were chosen to bear the chief parts in the pageant, and to receive the honour of knighthood from the King's hand. The General Otto Krumpe bore the 1 Olai Petri, pp. 344, 345. * Tegel, 1520. 3 Olai Petri, p. 345. 48 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. crown, Severin Norby the sceptre, Henry Gix the globe, General Peywick the sword. The two first, with Claus Bille and some other officers, were knighted. The King excused himself for not ex- tending the same honour to the Swedes : " He had vindicated his right to the crown by force of arms : in this work the Swedes had given him no assistance. At another time, however, he hoped to show them the same grace that he had now manifested to the most distinguished of his Danish officers." 1 Whatever disagreeable impressions might have been made by these proceedings the King endea- voured to efface by the courtesy and friendliness of his demeanour during the festivities which followed, and which lasted three days ; 2 but in the midst of these he held a cabinet council, in which, after ob- serving that the Swedes were jealous of their free- dom, and that unless they were in time and com- pletely subdued they would not long endure a strict government, he proposed to root out, as had been done in Norway, the distinguished families, and leave only a commonalty, which, without leaders, might be more easily brought to submission. He demanded of his councillors how this might be ac- complished with the greatest effect and safety. Some suggested that a quarrel should be got up between the military and the townspeople, and that, in the 1 Hvitfeldt, 1520 ; Olai Petri, p. 345. 2 Instruit convivium pro regio luxu ipse se effingit ad omnem speciem comitatis et hilaritatis. — Christ. Ilndi. attentata in Sueciam ; Ziegler, vol. ii. p. 133. Chap. II. SLAGHEC'S COUNSEL. .49 confusion which would ensue, they should take off whom they pleased. But this was thought a hazardous scheme, and liable — as giving the citizens the right to arm — to be turned against its contrivers. Others suggested that gunpowder should be placed under the castle, and a charge of treason founded thereupon against the Swedish nobles. 1 Finally, however, the counsel of Didrik Slaghec, called after this, by a slight change of pronunciation, Slag-hok (Slaughter-hawk), prevailed. He was the King's confessor, a Westphalian by birth, and had been once what our ancestors would have called a barber's clerk, but what we should call a surgeon's assistant ; and if we imagine a rank between the two, and an occupation uniting both mysteries, we shall have a tolerable idea of what had been his social position. He is said to have been related to the mother of Diverke, the King's deceased mistress, Sigbrit, to whom many of Christian's evil deeds were attributed, and who had known how to preserve, by her own talent, the influence first acquired by the grace and beauty of her daughter. 2 Slaghec suggested that the King wielded two swords, the temporal and the spiritual; the first in his own right, the other on behalf of the Pope. The King might forgive offences against himself, but not those against the Holy See. His promise of oblivion for the past, therefore, was to be kept as far as he 1 Scond. Illust., vol. iv. p. 87 ; Zeigler, p. 133. a The Rimchronica represents Sigbrit as having once carried nuts and apples to market and kept a public-house in Bergen, E 50 GUSTAVTJS VASA. Chap. II. was personally concerned, but in his capacity of representative of the Church was not binding. Let him then bring the excommunication into play, and deal with all, who had taken part against Archbishop Trolle, as heretics. 1 On the Wednesday after the coronation the Arch- bishop, by previous concert with the King, came forward in the hall of Stockholm Castle, where the guests were assembled, and, advancing to the throne, demanded that Stekeborg should be rebuilt, and the authors of his own and the ex-Archbishop's misfor- tunes punished. The accusation being pointed against Sten Sture and his adherents, in justification of her husband Christina Gyllenstjerna produced the deed which solemnly deposed the Archbishop and decreed the destruction of Stekeborg. The King received it gladly, and at once resolved to treat all who had signed it as heretics. They were asked separately, whether they acknowledged their signatures, and, when they could not deny them, they were all taken into custody, with the exception of Otto Bishop of Vesteras, who had joined the Archbishop as accuser, and John Brask, Bishop of Linkoping, who, having desired that his seal might be broken, and the words " I have been necessitated and compelled " having been found under it, was left at liberty. 2 The prisoners were committed for the night to the 1 Hvitfeldt, 1520 ; Scond. Illust., vol. iv. p. 87. The Pope (Leo X.) had ordered only the rebuilding of Stekeborg, compensation for damages, and a pecuniary fine. • Olai Petri, p. 346 ; Laurentii Petri, p. 148. Chap. II. CONDEMNATIONS FOR HERESY. 51 tower, chapel, and other parts of the castle. In the mean time it was referred to a tribunal consisting of the Archbishop, the Bishop of Odensee, the Bishop of Linkoping, and other ecclesiastics — among whom Lars Anderson, or Laurentius Andreoa, as he is often called, and Peter Galle, will appear again in this history — to consider what was the crime involved in the things complained of* when they declared that the perpetrators " after the just law of Holy Church, the Emperor, and Sweden, were manifest heretics." l It is said that the public executioners conveyed to the victims their death's doom. When they asked for the last consolations of religion, the boon was denied. On the morning of the execution, the 8th of November, the inhabitants of Stockholm were for- bidden on pain of death to leave their houses before a signal to be given by sound of trumpet. The cannon on the castle were loaded, and others so placed as to command the principal streets. A heavy gloom and dark foreboding oppressed the minds of all the people. When the clock struck twelve, the trumpet sounded, and' they were summoned to the great square or market-place of the city. The castle gates were soon after opened, the drawbridge lowered, and the unhappy prisoners brought forth. These were Mathias Bishop of Strengness, Vincen- tius Bishop of Skara, twelve secular nobles, most of them members of the State Council, including Eric Abrahamson(Lejonhufvud), Eric Johanson, the father, 1 Hvitfeldt, 1520, where the judgment is given at length. E 2 52 G-USTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. and Joachim Brahe, the brother-in-law of Gustavus, the burgomaster and town council of Stockholm, and many burgesses. A Danish knight, Nicholas Lycke, addressed the people, telling them not to be terrified at what they would witness, that the Archbishop had three times on bended knee besought the King that sentence of death might be executed on the culprits, and that he had at length yielded to his request; but Bishop Vincentius interrupted him, by exclaiming that not a word of truth had been uttered, that the King could do nothing without hies and deceit, and that he prayed God for vengeance on his tyranny. 1 Christian, who beheld all this from a window of the old council-house, now gave a sign that the sentence should be carried into execution. Bishop Mathias was the first victim. He had taken with him to the coronation his chancellor, Olaus Petri, and Laurentius Petri his brother, who, as he stood with his hands raised up to Heaven awaiting the blow of the executioner, rushed forward to embrace him ; but before they could reach the spot his head rolled upon the ground. Horrified at the sight, they said this was inhuman work upon a noble and venerable man, when they were seized themselves, and would have been sacri- ficed had not a German who had studied with them at Wittemburg declared that they were not 1 Ziegler, vol. ii. p. 133 ; Olai Petri, pp. 346, 347. The Archbishop, in fact, does not appear to have been privy to the plot, and incurred the King's sharp rebuke and some personal danger for not demanding the lives of those whom he accused. — lb. Chap. II. MASSACRE OP SWEDES. 53 Swedes. 1 Bishop Vincentius was next beheaded, then the lay nobles, then the burgesses. Olaus Magnus, trembling all the while for his own life, saw ninety-four persons beheaded. Others were hanged or subjected to painful and horrible deaths. According to the account of Ziegler, a contemporary historian, one Johannes Magnus was crucified, with circumstances of the most revolting cruelty, but the story is too disgusting to be related, if not too horrible to be believed. 2 The slaughter continued through the second and third days, because the general proclamation of peace and security continually enticed out fresh victims. Some were put to death because they could not refrain from tears at the sight of friends and neigh- bours so ruthlessly destroyed. 3 Some, — these chiefly the servants and retainers of the great nobles, — were dragged from their horses as they rode into the town, and hanged in such numbers that girths and stirrup- leathers must supply the lack of halters. The gutters ran red with blood, and the miserable survivors stepped over them with superstitious care, lest a stain upon their dress should seem to mark them out as the next sacrifice. For three days the bodies re- mained upon the market-place. They were then 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. 94. 2 Vertot, however, has not scrupled to give it in his own language. He calls Ziegler oculatus testis, but this does not appear on the face of the narrative, and he cites no authority. Geijer supposes Ziegler to have taken his account from others. 3 Hvitfeldt, 1520. 54 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. II. carried out and burnt in the south suburb, on the site of the present church of St. Catherine. It was the proper funeral of heretics, and, that Sten Sture might share it, his dead body and that of his infant child were torn from the grave, and cast upon the burning pile. 1 While the massacre was still proceeding, Christian sent out a proclamation to the provinces, stating that, by the advice of the bishops, prelates, and other wise men, he had punished Sten Stare's chief confe- derates, as heretics under the ban of the Church ; but that he meant thenceforward to govern the country mildly and peaceably, after the law of St. Eric. The massacre extended even to Finland, where the grey hairs, advanced years, and recent services of Hem- ming Gadd were all ineffectual to save him — for the King was in the high character of the avenger of religion, and must not indulge his own feelings and private preferences. Vengeance must descend with stern impartiality upon friend and foe alike ! 2 Among the victims were two children of the noble family of Ribbing; and the King's last exploit in Sweden, his "valete" to the people, as Laurentius Petri calls it, was the drowning of the abbot and some monks of the monastery of Nydala. 3 1 Laurentius Petri, p. 149. 8 " Ut igitur religionis prastextu inauditam fucaret crudelitatem, zelum se habere pro Eomana sede, cujus erat alioqui acerrimus hostis, impudentissime finxit." — Chron. Skibyense ; Rer. Dan. Script., vol. ii. p. 569. 3 Olai Petri, p. 348 ; Laurentius Petri, p. 149. Chap. II. COMING RETRIBUTION. 55 Thus were the oaths so often renewed, and hal- lowed by so many solemnities, cast to the winds and forgotten. But the vengeance of Heaven was already upon the track of the contriver and chief abettors of these wholesale murders, and the very means taken by the King to strengthen the foundations of his throne were the occasion of its overthrow. 56 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. CHAPTER III. Gustavus leaves Stockholm — His wanderings and dangers In Dale- carlia — Elected Captain-General of the kingdom ' — His first victory — Proceedings of the Government — Their troops defeated — Gustavus declares war against Christian — Takes Vester&s — Siege of the citadel — Great accession to his army — Execution of Slaghec as adviser of the Bloodbath. Aftek the Bloodbath — for that was the terrible name which the Swedes gave to the massacre at Stockholm — the neighbourhood of the capital was doubly insecure to Gustavus, and he resolved to go into Dalecarlia, where the independent character of the people and their attachment to the Stures gave him good hope of a friendly reception. He left Kaefness on horseback on the 26th November, 1520, accompanied by a single servant, who, as they were crossing Kolsund ferry, stole off with the saddle- bags, in which were his effects and money. He discovered the theft in time to give chase and re- cover the saddle-bags, but the rogue escaped into the forest. When he reached the frontier of Dalecarlia he exchanged his dress for a peasant's, and towards, the end of the month arrived at the Coppermine, with his hair cut short, and in the jacket, breeches, and round hat which was the proper costume of a Dalesman. 1 1 Tegel, 1520. " This land of valleys is inhabited by a people, in number 133,895 individuals, who retain much of the ancient simplicity Chap. III. HIS WANDERINGS. 57 Among his first employers was Anders Pehrson, of Bankhyttan, a rich miner, whom he served for a time unsuspected in different kinds of farm labour ; but a maid-servant, happening one day to catch sight of a gold-embroidered collar beneath the jacket of the pretended peasant, communicated what she had seen to her master, who, looking attentively into the young man's face, recognised the features of a former schoolfellow at Upsala. The courage of Anders Pehrson was not equal to the risk of harbouring a refugee of such importance, and Gustavus was fain to leave Kankhyttan in search of another hiding- place. In attempting to cross from Vika to Tor- sanger, the ice at the ferry, which was frozen over, gave way with him, but in the end produced no worse effects than a wet skin and a night's delay at the hut of the ferryman. The next morning he pro- ceeded to Orness, the abode of Arendt (Aaron) Pehrson, a nobleman who had served under him at Brankyrka. To his brother in arms Gustavus did not scruple to discover himself, and was received with a soldierly frankness and hospitality that pre- sented a gratifying contrast to the churlish caution of his late protector. Unfortunately, all this kind- ness was but a mask. Soon after Gustavus was of manners, mode of living, and dress. The Dalecarle still thinks himself, as our Highlanders do, of a superior caste, and adheres proudly to his white wadmal coat, his breeches with huge buttons and knee- buckles, his hose gartered below the knee, and his wife to her red stockings, high-heeled shoes, and yellow cap."— Laing's ' Observations in Sweden,' p. 221. 58 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. fairly lodged in the house, his host left it to take measures for his capture. The humanity of his hostess, a niece of Bishop Otto (SwinhufVud), saved him. Suspecting her lord's treachery, she warned her guest of his danger, provided him with a horse, sledge, and guide, and sent him away to Swedsjo parsonage. When Arendt Pehrson came back, with a band of soldiers and the King's lieutenant, Gus- tavus was beyond his reach. 1 He remained a week with the worthy pastor of Swedsjo, who, when he could protect him no longer, sent him- secretly to Swen Elfson (or Nilson), a royal forester of great courage and presence of mind, living at Isala-by. Elfson's wife was no unworthy helpmate of such a husband. Some followers of the King's lieutenant came in search of her guest one day, as she was making bread, and he was warming himself at the oven. His look indicated some disquiet, and might have betrayed him, had she not given him a smart blow with the spoon with which she was stirring the bread, asked him, with an expression of impatience, if he had never seen soldiers before in all his life, and sent him sharply off to his duties in the barn. When he was obliged at length to shift again his quarters — the neighbourhood being beset with Danes — Elfson hid him under some straw in his light waggon. Some Danish troopers, coming up with 1 Tegel, 1520. In 1688 Charles the Eleventh ordered a sum to be set aside for the maintenance of the barn in which G-ustavus threshed at Rankhyttan, as a national monument. — Celsius, vol. i. p. 102. Chap. III. HIS APPEALS TO THE DALESMEN. 59 them as they journeyed, in lieu of a more formal search, thrust their spears into the straw and wounded Gustavus. The blood began to trickle down on the snow, and would have infallibly discovered his hiding-place, had not the forester, by giving his horse unobservedly a gash in the leg, diverted attention from the point whence the stream had issued. 1 Having eluded the troopers by the dexterity of his quick-witted guide, Gustavus arrived safe at Mar- ness. Here for three days he lay concealed under a large uprooted fir-tree, supplied with food by the peasants. From thence he went farther up into the forest, took up his abode on a hill, still called the King's Hill, surrounded by a morass, and again found a hiding-place for some time under an old fir- tree. On the green before the church at Rattvik, his next retreat, he first, and not with much success, publicly addressed the Dalesmen. At Mora, the largest and most populous parish in the Dales, he addressed them again, described the massacre, touched with feeling upon his own share in that calamity, and offered himself to be their leader to avenge the blood which had been spilled, and " to teach the tyrant that Swedes must be ruled by law, not ground down by cruelty." 2 His address did not make the impression he had expected. Some, in- 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. 106. Gustavus the Third in-J&8£ erected a monument in porphyry, with an inscription beginning, " Here threshed Gustavus Erikson." The barn still belonged to the descendants of Swen Elfson in 1834. — Geijer, vol. ii. p. 16. 2 Peter Brahe, Hist. Gust., apud Celsium, p. 110. 60 aUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. deed, were for arming straightway, but others ad- vised him to consult his own safety and go farther into the woods. Much discouraged by this advice, he crossed, at the end of the year, the boundary which separates the eastern and western Dales, in- tending to go into Norway. But brighter days were at hand. Soon after he left Mora a party of 100 Swedes in the Danish interest, who had come thither to capture him, were surrounded by a large armed multitude of Dalesmen, besieged in the parsonage and church-tower — where they had sought refuge, and which long after bore marks of the Dalesmen's arrows — and released only upon their solemn promise to offer no injury to Gustavus. These symptoms of awakened spirit were increased with the new year, which brought a confirmation of the barbarities at Stockholm, and the rumour of fresh enormities and fresh burdens meditated by Christian. Neither rack nor gibbet were to be spared; the peasantry were to be disarmed and stripped in order to pay the merce- naries in the King's service. The Dalesmen now regretted that they had allowed Gustavus, the only man (as their informant told them) able to liberate the country, to go away. A messenger was sent after the fugitive, and happily came up with him just as he was about to cross the hills to Norway. 1 Upon his return to Mora he was elected by the chief peasants of the eastern and western Dales Captain-General of the kingdom. Sixteen active 1 Tegel, 1520 ; Hvitfeldt, 1520 ; Geijer, vol. ii. pp. 18, 19. Chap. III. ELECTED CAPTAIN-GENEEAL. 6 1 young men were appointed to be his life-guard, and two hundred more attached especially to his personal service. 1 Thus ended the time of shifts, disguises, and humiliations ; but the scenes of these, the barns where he threshed, the places where he lay con- cealed, the different spots where he was in the greatest peril, are still pointed out with veneration by the descendants of those, who succoured him in his adversity, and boasted that they were the first to help him to his crown. It was during this period that a Dane, who had served under Sture and now devoted himself to the fortunes of his kinsman, at- tacked the under-lieutenant of Vesteras, one of Gus- tavus's most formidable pursuers, and put him to death. 3 In the beginning of February, 1521, the new Cap- tain-General marched to the Copper-mine, took the Provost prisoner, seized upon all the King's and Dan- ish property in the place, and imposed upon the in- habitants a yearly tribute and tithe of corn. Out of the silks taken from the shops, banners were made for the patriot army. 3 The gold and silver were set apart for their pay, and the provisions shared among them. Gustavus returned to the same place soon after, at the head of 1500 Dalesmen, when the Bergsmen also joined him. The Helsinglanders — 1 Hvitfeldt, 1520 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 20. s Tegel, 1520. a Hvitfeldt, 1521 ; Scond. Illust., vol. v. p. 1. 62 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. between whom and the Bergsmen and Dalesmen there had always been a friendly alliance, — though invited to unite with them, kept aloof, thinking Gus- tavus had undertaken more than he could accomplish. In Gestrickland his solicitations met with more success. The inhabitants generally, and the town of Gefle particularly, promised him their support. Here too several of the refugees from Stockholm, Peter Fredag, Jons Warg, and others, enrolled themselves under his banner. On his hasty return from Ge- strickland, occasioned by a false report that his troops, left under the command of his generals, had been defeated, he heard the joyful news of his first victory. 1 After the King's departure the government was conducted by Didrik Slaghec, and J. Baldenacke, the son of a shoemaker, who by his capacity and dili- gence had worked his way to distinction ; and by such of the State Council as the executioner's sword had spared, and were not ashamed to be associated with names of so much infamy. Slaghec and Bal- denacke had been rewarded for their services in the massacre by the bishopsrics of Skara and Sfcreng- ness, which they had helped to make vacant. The burgomasters of Stockholm seconded the zeal of the supreme government in the King's cause. The city was more strongly fortified, vessels fitted out on pretence of " preventing the escape of Gustavus Erikson and the partners of his crime ;" but really to 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Geijev, vol. ii. p. 21. Chap. III. PKOCEEDINGS OP THE COUNCIL. 63 keep open the navigation, which had been impeded since the fishermen and peasants of the islands in the port of Stockholm had taken arms on the popular side. Warning proclamations were sent off to the Dales, signed by Gustaf and Eric Trolle and Knut Bengston, as the State Council. But they missed their aim, for the Dalesmen observed that the Council must be at a low ebb indeed if it consisted of only three members, and they of no great worth. 1 These missives, however, were only the precursors to something more alarming. Six thousand men marched to the Dales under Gustavus Trolle, Slaghec, and Baldenacke, and posted themselves on this side the river (Dalelfven) at Brunbeck-ferry. On the other side of the stream the Dalesmen guarded their fron- tier under Peter Swenson, a Dalesman of influence, whom Gustavus at his departure had left in com- mand. Peter Brahe relates that the retreat of the Danish army was occasioned by a speech of Balde- nacke, when he found out that those with whom they were about to grapple were accustomed to drink water, and, in case of necessity, to eat bark bread. 2 "A people," said he, "who can live upon wood and water the Devil himself could not conquer, much less any other. Let us go hence." The truth, however, 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 23. 8 " The bark-bread is made of the inner rind of the birch-tree, which is perfectly white, and when mixed with rye-meal is not unpleasant to the taste, but it is not considered nutritious, and affects the bowels when made use of for a long period." — Northern Field Sports, vol. i. p. 60. 64 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. appears to be, either that Swenson by a stolen march crossed the river at Utsundford, took the Danish army by surprise and put it to flight, or that, the latter having resolved to retreat, because they found themselves outnumbered, Swenson by this manoeuvre turned the retreat into a rout. 1 Gustavus, having by his successful negotiations in Gestrickland secured friends in his rear, prepared to advance into the country. He collected and drilled his recruits at Hedemora, taught the Dalesmen, who had as yet no fire-arms, and knew little of the art of war, to make their arrows after a better fashion, and to lengthen their spears, that they might cope more effectually with cavalry. At the same place he esta- blished a mint, and issued a coinage consisting of copper with a small admixture of silver, of the same current value as the pieces contemptuously called Christian's Klippingar. The device on one side was an armed man, on the other two Dale arrows. 2 As he passed over Longheden into Vestmanland, the people everywhere flocked to his standard ; and when, on St. George's day, the 23rd of April, he reviewed and brigaded his army, it was 15,000 strong. 3 It was now that Gustavus published his declara- tion of war against Christian. The declaration set forth these chief points: — 1. That Christian was not 1 Tegel (1521) says that the retreat was determined by the superior number of the insurgents. He notices, however, the Count's story. 8 Tegel, 1521 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 117. 3 So says Tegel, but Messenius and others 5000 only. Scond. Illust.,. torn. v. p. 2. Chap. III. DECLARES WAR AGAINST CHRISTIAN. 65 lawfully king — his election and coronation having been accomplished by underhand practices and the presence of a Danish army. 2. That, if even he had been lawfully elected, not having himself kept his coronation oaths, his subjects were absolved from their oaths of allegiance. 3. Much more was he, Gus- tavus Erickson, who had never sworn him allegiance, free to disobey him, and combine with all other good Swedes in avenging the blood which he had spilt, and which still cried out for vengeance. 1 Three days before his attack upon Vesteras, which was his next enterprise, he had the mortification to hear that a party of Bergsmen, whom he expected as a reinforcement, had been cut to pieces. Peter Ugla, the leader of the party — having discovered that Anders Pehrson, the Danish commandant at Orebro, had been tampering with his troops — went in pursuit of him as far as Koping. Here he gave up the chase, and, fancying himself secure, drank till he became intoxicated, an example followed by most of his soldiers. Pehrson, having ascertained the state of his pursuers, proceeded to Vesteras, and returned in the dead of the night with 3000 men, furnished him from that city. He found Ugla and his party sleeping by their watch-fires, heavy with drink and the exertions of the day before; and falling upon them in that. condition, destroyed almost all. As a stratagem of war the deed was, it may be, fair and honourable, and the perpetrator obtained afterwards 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. 122. F 66 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. from Gustavus pardon and a letter of protection. But the simple Bergsmen took it much to heart that Pehrson should have fallen upon their kinsmen asleep and defenceless ; accordingly for six long years they nursed their vengeance, and, when at last a fit opportunity presented itself, they wreaked it on the unhappy commandant by putting him to death. 1 Didrik Slaghec was now in command at Vesteras. Henry von Mehlen, the late commandant, having gone away, had left as his substitute one Fynboo, who refused Slaghec the admission he had personally demanded. From whatever motive the refusal ori- ginated, Slaghec was greatly incensed at it, brought against the city a force too formidable to be resisted, and, when the gates were opened, hanged or decapi- tated all who had opposed his entrance. He prepared for the defence of the place with energy. His cavalry was the arm which he thought would be most for- midable against a peasant force, and, that this might act with greater effect against it, he levelled all the enclosures in the neighbourhood. 2 On the 29th of April Gustavus's advanced guard passed over the ridge of Balung, to encamp at St. ' OlofF's chapel. They had strict orders not to ad- vance against the enemy that day ; but when they saw the latter coming out to attack them with their cavalry, " like hungry wolves" (as Tegel expresses it), it was too much for the forbearance of young levies. They rushed forward to meet them, repulsed ' Tegel, 1521. * Ibid. ; Greijer, vol. ii. p. 26. Chap. III. TAKES VESTERAS. 67 their charge with their long spears, and then pursued them with darts and arrows, until 400 men and horses were stretched on the ground. When Gus- tavus found that his front was engaged with the enemy, he pressed into the midst of the danger and had several of his officers killed by his side. In the mean time one of his generals, Lars Erickson, had reached the town by a byway, and, making straight for the market-place, captured the field artillery posted there and a quantity of ammunition. The garrison of the citadel now fired upon the houses, which, with the roof and tower of the cathedral, were for the most part ruined, though the patriots endea- voured to extinguish the flames. The defenders were in complete bewilderment. Some rode into the water up to their necks, some plunged in headlong, while others, throwing away their weapons, burst into the monastery, and prayed the monks to give them absolution and comfort for their souls. On the other hand, a good many of the victors gave themselves up to pillage and riot. They spoiled the shops of their merchandise, and, having seized a quantity of wine, took it to the Council-house, where they began drink- ing and singing. The Danish party, reinforced from the castle, were not slow to observe and profit by this disorder ; and the fortune of the day would pro- bably have been reversed had not Gustavus sent Lars Olofson with the reserve into the town, where, after a fresh conflict, the enemy was completely routed. The remnant again took refuge in the f 2 68 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. monastery, where they remained till Whitsuntide, and then, having reinforced the citadel with a part of their number, proceeded to Stockholm. When the contest was over, Gustavus with his own hands struck the hoops from the wine and mead casks, saying (according to some accounts) that he would rather see the streets stream with liquor than with the blood of his soldiers. 1 If, while the citadel remained in the hands of the enemy, the success at Vesteras was inconsiderable in itself, it was far from being so in its consequences. The moral effect of the victory was of the most essential service to the patriotic cause. Wherever the news came it determined the doubtful, and such numbers now joined Gustavus that he could afford to divide his forces and prosecute several sieges at once. Arvid Vestgothe (the Westgothlander) was there- fore sent to besiege Stekeborg and take East Goth- land. Linkbping and Orebro were invested at the same time, and Lars Erickson was detached to attack Upsala, a city where the old Kings of Sweden had held their court, but which had never been fortified* 2 The siege of the citadel of Vesteras was continued by some of the peasants of Vestmanland and Soder- manland, but Didrik Slaghec resigned the defence into other hands, and, the patriots still continuing to gain ground, went over to Denmark in the autumn in search either of safety or succour. As he appears 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Bruzelii, Hist. 238. ! Hvitfeldt, 1521 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 27. Chap. III. APPEAL TO THE POPE. 69 no more conspicuously in Sweden, we will now fol- low him to the end of his miserable career. Slaghec carried with him to Denmark Christina Gyllenst- jerna, Gustavus's mother and sisters, and other dis- tinguished ladies among the state prisoners. Soon after his arrival he received a fresh proof of his master's favour, having been made by him Arch- bishop of Lund, in spite of the reluctance and re- monstrances of the Chapter. 1 But he was not destined to glory long in his elevation. On the first news of the massacre at Stockholm, Johannes Magnus, Canon of Linkoping and after- wards Archbishop of Upsala, had hastened to Rome to demand vengeance against Christian. The execu- tion of two prelates added so much weight to that crime in the eyes of the pontiff, that, though unwill- ing to strike the King, on account of his connexion with the Emperor, he could not . refuse inquiry. J. F. de Potentia, a Neapolitan monk, was. de- spatched for the purpose, but with secret orders to view the matter in as favourable a light as possible for the accused ; while Christian, conscious of his danger, and willing to save himself at all events, re- solved to sacrifice the Archbishop, that he might be in some sort personally exculpated. 2 • * Hvitfeldt, 1521 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 6 ; Hist, de Dannemarc, vol. vi. p. 506. His predecessor in the archbishopric was George, a Schotborg, whom the King compelled to resign and retire to a cloister, from whence, however, he escaped, and died in banishment at Cologne, 1551. — Holberg, vol. ii. p. 100. 2 Mallet, Histoire de Dannemarc, vol. vi. p. 506 ; Scondia Illust., torn. v. p. 6. 70 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. III. Slaghec had been only two months in possession of his high dignity when he was summoned to Copen- hagen to answer the charge of having been the ad- viser of the Bloodbath. The charge was readily proved : he was found guilty and sentenced to death. 1 On the 24th of January, 1522, the sentence was carried into effect. The King had left Copenhagen and given orders that the execution should take place during his absence. The scene of it was the old market-place or square of the city. The windows of Sigbrit commanded the spot, but she kept her blinds closed that day and would not look upon the horrid spectacle. A gallows was erected and a pile of faggots heaped up near the Council- house, and hither the wretched man, richly and showily dressed, was conducted. When he came near the gibbet the executioner forced him up one or two steps of the ladder, then brought him down again, and led him to the blazing pile, where, un- pitied, if any who ever underwent that dreadful sentence could fail to move pity, he was burnt alive. 8 It is said that Baldenacke, who was himself after- wards deposed from his bishopric and imprisoned in the Hammershus at Borringholm, prophesied to 1 Hvitfeldt, 1522. But the Chron. Skibyense says lie was executed " absque publica juris sentential' 2 " Quo supplioio utinam omnes pereant, qui Prinoipum amnios, non nisi optimis rationibus imbuendos, corrumpunt atque pessimis oonsiliis labefactant." — Chron. Skibyense ; Eer. Dan. Sorip., vol. ii. p t 570. Chap. HI. EXECUTION OF SLAGHEC. 71 Slaghec in the height of his prosperity his coming fate. It needed not, however, more than common discernment to perceive upon how treacherous a foundation that prosperity depended, nor to predict that the tyrant himself would probably be the sword used to punish his accomplice. As they led him to the place of execution the Secretary, Jaspar Brockman, met him on the high bridge that led from the castle, when the unhappy prisoner exclaimed in Latin, "Farewell, Master Jaspar ; this is the reward of all my labours." But the Secretary answered quickly, " Not so, not so ; it is the punishment of thy crime!" 1 1 Hvitfeldt, 1522. "Vale! magister Caspare! hasc sunt prasmia laborum nostrorum." Jasper answered, "Non non, pcena peccati, poena peccati." 7'2 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. CHAPTER IV. Attack on Upsala ■ — Capture of the Archbishop's palaoe — Gustavus retreats — Pursues the Archbishop to Stockholm — Brask, Bishop of Linkoping, joins the patriots — The crown rejected by Gustavus,, who is elected Begent — Guerilla war -^ Siege of Stockholm — The Archbishop leaves Sweden — Christian orders another massacre — Execution of Thomas, the chief perpetrator — Inefficient assistance from Lubeck — The capital submits — Dethronement of Christian — Gustavus elected King of Sweden. Gustavus — in his speech at the celebrated Diet of Vesteras in 1527 — dated the beginning of the libera- tion from the victory gained in that city five years before. He stated at the same time that it was only the beginning. Much had yet to be accomplished before the enemy was completely subdued and driven from the kingdom ; but the Dalesmen, who (as the King complained) took to themselves the whole credit of that achievement, for the most part went home, after the success at Vesteras, to sow their spring corn, and attend to the other requirements of their farms at that season. To supply their places, Gustavus summoned the peasants from the dhTerent parts of Upland to assemble at Eymningen forest near Oresunds-bro ; and it was while awaiting his arrival at this point that his generals made their attack upon Upsala, where the Bishop's palace was the object especially aimed at. Chap. IV. -ATTACK ON UPSALA. 73 Some intimation of the intended attack had been given, and disregarded. For the generals had re- plied to a deputation from the city, praying that they would not interfere with the usual procession on St. Eric's day — " that Swedes, not foreigners, ought to bear the shrine of St. Eric on his festival, and that they meant to be there." The spies, sent out by the Archbishop's provost to ascertain the strength of the insurgents, had been captured, but he consoled him- self for the want of their report by the idea that his 100 horse and three regiments of infantry would be a match for all the peasants, who could be brought against them. To show his contempt the more de- cidedly, he held a fete on the planted space (tra- garden) between the great and little palace, where his soldiers indulged in song and revelry till a late hour. It was two in the morning when the patriots arrived, and they had cut down the watch posted be- fore St. George's chapel, destroyed the defences which protected the entrance of the palace, and already made a breach in the door, before the re- vellers awoke. 1 After an ineffectual attempt to repel their be- siegers, some of the Bishop's soldiers attempted to escape, or, according to other accounts, to take the enemy in the rear, by means of a wooden covered way which communicated with the cathedral. This design was defeated by the patriots setting fire to the outlet. The Provost, on his side, having first fired 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Hvitfeldt, 1521. 74 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. the town, mounted his horse and with a party of his followers endeavoured to escape by Flotesund. In this attempt he was shot by an arrow, which passing up from the hand to the elbow remained in the Wound. He continued his journey to Stockholm notwithstanding ; but when the Archbishop's surgeon extracted the arrow, he died under the operation. 1 At Whitsuntide G-ustavus himself came to Upsala, and, having required of the Chapter now to choose their party, they asked leave to consult their dio- cesan. This being granted, one of their body was sent to Stockholm with a despatch from themselves anq another from Gustavus. When the Archbishop opened the latter, which urged him to come over to the popular side, he said jeeringly to Henry Slaghec, Didrik's brother, who was present, that he would bring his own answer, and immediately ordered a de- tachment of 500 German horse and 3000 infantry to accompany him to Upsala. 2 The sanguine temper of Gustavus, Which had supported him hitherto, and was still to carry him through so many trials, had now nearly proved his ruin. He seems to have made up his mind that his appeal would be suc- cessful. His messenger not returning awakened no suspicion. Nay, when a deserter from the Arch- bishop rode forward and warned him of his danger, his story could not obtain credit. Convinced at last of the truth, he rode to the hill, on which he after- wards built the, present palace, to ascertain the force 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 128. a Tegel, 1521. Chap. IV. DANGER OF THE ARCHBISHOP. 75 of the enemy. He had with him at the time only 600, others say only 200, foot and about 100 horse- men, and, finding himself so greatly outnumbered, was compelled to fly. At Ladebyford 200 horse despatched by Trolle in pursuit came up, just as his page, a young Finnish nobleman, had ridden against him and overthrown both horse and rider into the stream. His gallant infantry, however, saved their leader. They attacked the enemy so vigorously with their arrows and other missiles that seventy of them were stretched upon the field and the rest put to flight. 1 Gustavus, after he had led his party to Eym- ningen forest, prepared an ambush for the Archbishop on his return to the capital ; and though the snare was eluded by the sagacity of an attendant, who had ridden forward and seen the remains of a newly- slaughtered ox near the road where the party had meant to pass, the prelate was still in great peril. The Swedes were soon upon his traces, and it was only by stooping to his horse's neck that he avoided the spear of Lars Oloffson, which ran into the body of a nobleman who was riding by his side. Of the force which he took with him on this expedition a sixth part barely, it is said, reached Stockholm again. Gustavus followed, and pitched his camp at Brunke- berg. A sally from the city, however, soon dislodg- ing him from tbat position, he retired to Eotebro. 2 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p.*29. 2 Hvitfeldt, 1521 ; Tegel, 1521. 76 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. One of the good fruits of this summer was the accession of Brask, Bishop of Linkoping, to the popular party. Arvid Vestgothe, during his cam- paign in that district, had proposed to make short work with the Bishop, who was halting between two opinions. But Gustavus would not have recourse to violence till other means should have proved inef- fectual. He wrote to the Bishop, therefore, remind- ing him of his narrow escape at the massacre. " He had not only then witnessed the murderous work of the tyrant, but had himself bent beneath the sword of the executioner. A mere accident had saved his life. He should now show that Heaven had spared him to serve his country. The affair concerned them both. The enterprise had already been happily begun, it rested with the Bishop to bring it to a good conclusion." Gustavus's presence in the vicinity of Munkeboda, the Bishop's castle, at the head of a con- siderable force, no doubt added weight to his per- suasions. A meeting took place between himself and the Bishop at Skarkind parsonage, when the latter agreed to lend his aid to the liberation of the kingdom. 1 On the 24th of August, 1521, a States-day, at which were present sixty nobles and many others of all ranks, took place at Vadstena. Gustavus, address- ing the Assembly, said that they had pnly one of two courses to follow. " If they were content to be for ever slaves to the Dane, and to abandon their pos- 1 Tegel, 1521. Chap. IV. ADDRESSES THE STATES. 77 sessions to the avarice of a greedy neighbour ; if they had the hearts to see the remaining flower of their nobility cut off, and could endure that Sweden, which had not only supported its own independence, but given the law to other lands, should degenerate into a Danish province — then indeed they had only to sit down quietly and watch the footsteps of the tyrant. But if they loved freedom, if they would avenge the innocent blood, which had run so piteously in their streets, if their houses and possessions were dear to them, if they would prove themselves worthy sons of their renowned fathers, and rather judge of other nations' misery than give an example of their own — then they would take the sword, and not let it sleep until they had dethroned the tyrant, and recovered the crown which he had wrested from their hands. Circumstances were most favourable to their enter- prise. Christian was hated by his own people, and required all his attention to secure himself in his he- reditary kingdom. He (Gustavus), with the help of the Dalesmen, had already subdued a large portion of the realm, and the chief fortresses were now all so hard beset that they could not offer a long resist- ance. The victory would soon be complete, if they would only combine their counsels and unite their strength." 1 To this address the States replied by offering him the Crown which Christian had forfeited. " That was the only way," they said, " to repay him for his. 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Westenhjelm, Hist. Gust, apud Oelsium, vol. i. p. 145. 78 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. great services and to save the kingdom." But Gus- tavus's ambition was neither shortsighted nor of a vulgar cast. The game was evidently in his own hands, and a show of moderation at the present mo- ment would enable him hereafter both to win it with a more hearty and general consent, and to use the fruits of it more to the public advantage. He replied that " he had taken arms from zeal and compassion for the people, and with no selfish view. The name of King had already, through the abuse of it, begun to have a hateful sound. To serve his country was a sufficient reward for him. They should unite their strength, and first place themselves in a condition to choose freely a native Swedish king. Then, whomso- ever they might deem fit for the honour, to him he would show all loyalty and obedience." 1 The Kegency, to which he was actually elected, was an office with very different powers from those it had possessed under Engelbrect and the Stures, when there was a powerful nobility to rival and restrain it : it was a monarchy in almost all but the name. Fortified by his new authority, the Regent pressed on his military operations, with as much haste and effect as his want of an efficient artillery and a regular army permitted. No battles on a large scale, or which present much to arrest the attention of a great commander, mark the progress of his arms : but they are not without those romantic traits of daring and ingenuity which are always more or less interesting 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. .145. Chap. IV. GUERILLA WAR. 79 to the unlearned, to whom the splendid combinations of military genius are often unintelligible. The o castle of Abo, in Finland, was attacked by General Arvidson on the 26th of November, but without success, and the commandant, a Danish nobleman named Thomas, a fit agent of the master whom he served, hung the next day from the walls of the castle three of the general's brothers and some other Swedes, who had been captured in the city. A guerilla warfare against the Danes, conducted by Nils Manson Krabbe, savagely avenged this and other acts of cruelty. Krabbe used to creep along the coast at night, accompanied by ten or at most sixteen armed companions, land at spots where he knew the Danes were located, barricade their houses, and then set fire to them ; " awaking the inmates," says Tegel, " with a sorrowful dream." When at daybreak a pursuit was attempted, he ran, in the light vessels which he made use of, under Refle or some other place of security, but upon the smallest opening was back again to continue his petty but most harassing and destructive warfare ; so that at last Krabbe with his handful of men was more dreaded than all Arvidson's army. 1 In the mean time the siege of Stockholm con- tinued, but the want of a fleet on the part of Gus- tavus gave the besieged breathing room towards the sea, and a channel by which they were- supplied with provisions. On Christmas Eve the garrison, to the 1 Tegel, 1521 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 149. 80 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. number of 1500, in 40 boats, sallied out to surprise and attack Peter Fredag's force, stationed at Lbfon. Fredag, who had been informed of the meditated attack, prepared to meet it by a stratagem, of which Gideon probably furnished the idea. 1 Choosing six- teen young men from his division, he gave each of them a bugle-horn, and placed them here and there around the hill, with instructions to repeat exactly the signal they heard sounded at his quarters. When the enemy had landed, and were making their way as well as they could in the darkness, whispering that they meant to pass their Christmas in Fredag's tent, he sounded a charge upon his bugle, which was taken up by the trumpeters, one after another, at their dif- ferent stations. The Danes, unacquainted with the ground, and imagining that the wood was filled with soldiers, took the alarm, and, when Fredag attacked them with a force of only 400 men, he slew 200 on the spot, and drove the rest to their boats, where many more, in the confusion and struggle to get on board, perished. 2 In the month of December, 1521, and the follow- ing January, the fortresses of Stekeborg, Nykoping, and Vesteras surrendered to the Regent. General Arvid Vestgothe, having put a Swedish garrison into the first, still lay before the place in order to deceive Norby, who was hourly expected with provisions and reinforcements. The stratagem succeeded. Norby, unconscious of the surrender, approached the fortress 1 Judges vii. 15. s Tegel, 1521 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 151. Chap. IV. PORTRESSES SURRENDERED. 81 incautiously, was suddenly attacked by the Swedes, and lost 600 men. 1 Thirty only fell on the side of Gustavus. At the surrender of Nykoping his sister, Joachim Brahe's widow, Margaret Vasa, who had been detained there in rigorous captivity, was re- leased. The Archbishop had now left the kingdom. 2 Be- fore bidding it a final farewell he had endeavoured to come to terms with Gustavus, still reserving his truth and allegiance to Christian. Gustavus's answer, though addressing the Archbishop in the usual terms of courtesy, spoke confidence in the strength of his cause. He advised him to abandon the King — " who was unable, hampered as he was with his own diffi- culties, to help his partisans — and to prefer living a noble in Sweden rather than a serf in Denmark. He (Gustavus) promised to pardon all the past. The Archbishop might depend upon this promise : it was not like other promises with which their age was familiar." 3 We may judge that this was a strain not very agreeable to the pride of Gustavus Trolle, but a rejoinder of the same sort as that carried to Upsala was now out of the question. He was compelled to bide his time. When, early in 1522, Severin Norby, after an 1 Tegel, 1522. s He accompanied Slaghec and Baldenacke in their flight in October ; driven away by fear, says Messenius ; for the purpose of asking forces to quell the insurrection, according to Hvitfeldt, 1521. — Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 6. s Celsius, vol. i. p. 154. G 82 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. engagement in which the besiegers were sorely- worsted, supplied Stockholm with provisions for the summer, the garrison was reduced by famine to 500. Without the walls of the citadel there was a ruined and empty town. The townspeople for the most part had fled, or were shut up in the castle ; so that the houses, which were not burnt down, were well nigh without inhabitants. After the relief, the secretary, Erickson, wrote to the King, " that of the burghers only 18, and those mostly Germans, could be de- pended on, but that there were 850 soldiers and archers now well provided with everything ; that the peasants, though tired of the war, feared still more the King's vengeance, and gave no credit to his assurances, so that the country could be brought to subjection only by force. If a sufficient army were sent there, Upland, &c, would submit, and his Ma- jesty could punish the Bergsmen and Dalesmen who had led the way in the rebellion." ' This was advice which Christian would have been glad to follow, but fortunately could not. He, how- ever, obeyed the call for fresh severities, as far as he was able, by giving orders to his commandants in Sweden for another massacre. Thomas, the com- O mandant at Abo, carried these cruel instructions out with so much fidelity that, as some report, he be- headed his own secretary, whom he liked, and who had been faithful to his interests, because he was a Swede. The brave Norby had (it is said) received 1 Hvitfeldt, 1522 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 168 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 33. Chap. IV. EXECUTION OF THOMAS. 83 similar instructions the year before, but had made no secret of disobeying them. 1 A few months only elapsed, and Thomas himself fell into the hands of his enemies. He had sailed from Finland to relieve the capital, and, when he drew nigh, had sent out a boat to make observations. The boat and crew fell into the hands of the Swedish Admiral, Fleming, who, having stripped the latter of their uniform, and equipped in it his own sailors, sent them in turn to reconnoitre the force of the Dane. Thomas, see- ing the boat approaching, and anxious to hear the result of his mission, got into another boat and rowed to meet it. On coming up he jumped on board, and then first discovered the snare into which he had fallen. His boat's crew was quickly overpowered and himself carried to Tynnelso, where, by command of Gustavus, he was hanged on an oak with a rope made of the fibres of the lime-tree. 2 An attack upon Stockholm, earlier in the year, conducted by Staffan Sasse — a Holsteiner, who in 1521 entered into the service of the Eegent with 60 Germans — Peter Fredag, and Knut Bengston, was rendered hopeless through the dissensions of the leaders. They were repulsed by the reinforced gar- rison with great loss. 3 Gustavus now sent his secretary to Lubeck to crave assistance. The result was that 10 ships, under Admiral Brun, and 900 infantry, under General 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 33 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 159. fi Tegel, 1522. s Celsius, vol. i. p. 161. G 2 84 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. Stammels, were sent to Stockholm, and appeared off Soderkqping on Whitsunday ; eight ships were after- wards added to this force. It is said that secret orders were given not to employ it too effectually. It is certain that the co-operation given was very feeble, and that when Norby, in a second attempt to relieve Stockholm in the month of October, had become entangled in the ice, the Lubeck commanders refused to join in an attack which under the circum- stances would have annihilated him. On another occasion — Norby having been driven by a storm under an island, and so close to it that the Swedes did him much damage even by flinging large stones on board his vessels — the Lubeckers refused Gus- tavus himself two pieces of cannon to fire upon the Danish Admiral, though he offered to mortgage two of his best fortresses as a security for the loan of them. Norby in consequence made his escape, and sailed to Calmar Sound. 1 The Germans, when they first landed, refused to swear the military oath of fidelity until, after a per- sonal interview with Gustavus, they were satisfied that he was worthy of their confidence. This feeling — if it were originally entertained on the King's side — did not long continue mutual, and when he deter- mined to press more closely the siege of Stockholm he withdrew his German troops and distributed them inland in different parts of the country. 2 1 Hvitfeldt, 1522 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 8 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 164. B Celsius, vol. i. p. 164. Chap. IV. STOCKHOLM TAKEN. 85 The city then scarcely extended heyond the little island which is now especially called by that name. Gustavus moved nearer to it the three divisions of his army, which were engaged in the blockade, and kept up his communications throughout the whole circuit by floating bridges, uniting Kungsholmen with Lang- holmen, and, again, the Sbdermalm (south suburb) with Djurgarden (the King's park), then called Waldemar's island. The harbour was further pro- tected by wooden forts and chaiivcables. 1 During this blockade Peter Fredag again distinguished him- self by repelling a sally of the garrison, but the block- ade itself was continued through the winter, until famine, combined with the intelligence of Christian's fall, brought the besieged, on the 21st of June, 1523, to submission. The tyrant, when he left Sweden after the mas- sacre, had gone to the Netherlands to obtain the balance of his Queen's dowry, and the assistance of the Emperor in his war with his uncle, Duke Fre- deric of Holstein, and the Hanse Towns. On his return he was met with the news of the insurrection in Sweden, and was so enraged (it is said) by the receipt of the despatch from Secretary Erickson that he hung the messengers by torchlight. 2 We have already seen how he attempted to escape the odium of the massacre by throwing the blame on Slaghec, but in vain — the share of each in that ever memor- 1 Tegel, 1523 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 35 ; Celsius, vol. i. p. 174. * Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 5, compared with Celsius. 86 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IV. able atrocity was well understood; Slaghec's share being that of suggesting the most plausible pretext for doing what the King was resolved to do in some way or other. The possibility that some similar atrocity was meditated filled the minds of the Danish nobility with gloom and misgivings. Some tokens of an attempt to restrain their privileges, and to court the commons, had already appeared. Moreover, the state of the prelates had been curtailed, and an arch- bishop forbidden? to travel with more than thirty, a bishop with more than ten followers. 1 Powerful enemies were thus raised in the centre of the King's dominions ; and how serious was the disaffection soon appeared, when at a States meeting called by him at Callundborg castle, to consult concerning the revolt in Sweden, the war with Lubeck, &c, the chief nobles did not appear, and insulted him by pleading the weather and contrary winds as an excuse for their absence. 2 He appointed notwithstanding another States-day in Aarhus, for the beginning of the follow- ing year ; but it was whispered abroad that Sigbrit had suggested counsels fatal to the nobility — that the King was to be accompanied at that meeting by dis- 1 Scondia Must., torn. v. p. 9. Some of Ms measures were excel- lent in themselves, for instance — that which forbade the nobles to sell their serfs and " traffic in the persons of Christians as if they were brute-beasts." The law also which gave the serf permission to run away, if ill-treated, tended to secure him tolerable usage. — Hist, de Dannemarc, vol. vi. p. 557. a The report was, that the King intended to extort from them an annual grant of two florins per head for each of their peasants, and a third part of the revenues of the Church. — Holberg, vol. ii. p. 117. Chap. IV. CHRISTIAN DEPOSED. 87 guised assassins — and that the massacre of Stockholm was to be repeated there. The nobles in consequence retired to Viborg ,on the 20th January, 1523, and drew up a deed, in which they renounced their alle- giance to' Christian, and chose Frederic Duke of Holstein to fill the vacant throne. 1 Magnus Munk, Lagman of Jutland, undertook to convey the perilous document. He met the King on his way to Aarhus, assumed an open and cheerful countenance, and being invited to dinner contrived to keep him amused and to divert all suspicion till he retired to rest, when, placing the despatch into one of his gloves, he left it on the table, went quietly out, and escaped by a boat which he had kept in readiness. A page, who found the despatch the next morning, carried it to the King. 2 Christian's courage fell at the receipt of this unex- pected paper. He wrote to those who had subscribed it, saying, " that he submitted himself to the Em- peror and other disinterested Princes as his judges. As to the massacre at Stockholm, he would atone for it ; he would fill the country with churches and mo- nasteries, and undergo any penance which the Pope might impose. The Council and States should have from him fresh securities, if only they would retract ' Hvitfeldt, 1523 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 10. Holberg, vol. ii. p. 117. s Holberg, vol. ii. i 2 son. 1 Tegel, 1523 ; Celsius, torn. i. pp. 225, 229 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 15. 2 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 50 ; also Dip. Dal., 1st October, 1524 (325). The allusion to devils is founded on the similarity of the Swedish name for them, troll, and the Archbishop's, Trolle, whom it was reported Gus- tavus meant to restore. The Dalesmen in their letter of the 1st May remind the King of his obligations to them " when he was a friendless wanderer in their woods," &c, and how ill he had performed the promises he then made them. — Dip. Dal., 349. 120 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VI. In the spring of 1525 the deposed prelates, who had kept up a correspondence with Norby, and hoped to turn his successes to good account, forged letters in the name of the Dalesmen that a rising was at hand. These letters were spread, about Easter, throughout the kingdom, but did not produce the effect intended. John Larson, Dean of Upsala, wrote to Gustavus at this time, pointing out some of the causes of the prevailing discontent. He received the following answer, dated the 23rd April, 1525 : — " You write that the people are angry that the Bishop of Vesteras has not a sufficient number of retainers. We should rather expect them to be angry if he came with a multitude, burthening first one and than another ; but you and many others may perhaps take offence thereat ; you, who cannot, or will not, think otherwise than that to the office of a bishop is attached some great worldly dignity, not consider- ing that the Scripture holds them to be the servants of all in the Gospel, and that they can fulfil this duty far better with few retainers than with many. * * * " You write further, that it is highly advisable that nothing be violently or unjustly taken from churches and monasteries. Would to God that our forefathers had only been as careful that nothing had been filched from the Crown and nobles by fraud and imposture, as folks nowadays take care to keep what they thus obtained whether right or wrong. We do not know whether we have violently taken Chap. VI. HIS LETTER TO THE DEAN OF UPSALA. 121 anything from churches and monasteries, as you write ; but we do know that we are he who restored them what their enemies had sliced away, and pre- served what was threatened to be sliced away in like manner. " Another person is now bestirring himself — I mean King Christian — making much ado to regain the kingdom of Sweden. Should he succeed — which God forbid — you will find that he will filch from you and from others in a very different fashion from what we have either done or wish to do ; and if you and the Chapter had well considered, you would have been quite as well advised had you defended our pro- ceedings, instead of aggravating the case whenever the priests, who are under you, had taken them ill or misunderstood them. If you yourself had given the matter due consideration, you, Master John, had no good grounds to fall in so readily with those who batter at our shield ; and though you write that you do so with the best intentions, we can well perceive, from your style, to which side you incline. Now you are the man in whom, of all Upsala, we have placed the most confidence — you are he whom we have highly exalted — you are he whom we have most delighted to honour. See that you prove yourself sensible of this ; that for the future will best become you. " There is no occasion, we think, to write to the Chapter of Upsala touching their religious duties, as you advise ; hoping that they are as zealous for God's 122 GUSTAVUS VASA. • Chap. VI. service as they are to take care not to be deprived of their possessions." ' Early in May the States assembled at Vesteras, when the King complained both of the rebel Bishops and of Norby, who had taken advantage of the scarcity of provisions, and especially of salt, to stir up the people against him. His offer to resign the Crown if his government was displeasing to the States, was met by loyal assurances of support, both in sup- pressing the disturbances, and in punishing the trai- tors. As an earnest of their good intentions it was voted, that every freeholder of less than 400 marks should have a good suit and a musket for the defence of the state ; every freeholder above 400, a horse and harness ; and every freeholder who had 200 marks of Crown rent, three men with horses and har- ness complete for nine months in the year. 8 Having thus corroborated his authority, Gustavus proceeded to the Dales, summoned the people to meet him at Tuna-Kyrka, and held a parley with them, surrounded by a considerable body of well- armed troops. Convinced by his arguments, or over-' awed by this display, the Dalesmen humbly acknow- ledged that they had been misled, promised to be less credulous in future, and to give credit to nothing which could seduce them from their allegiance. 1 Gust. Letter to the Dean of Upsala, John Larson, K. E., f6l. 247 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 12. 2 Tegel, 1525. The meeting, Sunday next after the Feast of St. Philip and St. James. Chap. VI. THE BISHOPS SURRENDERED. 123 The rebel Bishops fled to Norway on the King's approach, and found a refuge with the Archbishop of Drontheim. The King demanded them back from the Norwegian Council, in virtue of that article of the treaty of Malmo by which it was agreed that the promoters of rebellion in the one country should not find protection in the other. The Council consented to deliver up the refugees, but demanded a safe-con- duct, which Gustavus sent, in these terms, that " they should experience no injury in coming to Sweden, but should there stand their trial before their proper judges, and undergo what justice demanded." The Archbishop suggested that their proper judges were the prelates of the Church, seeing that the accused were churchmen. Gustavus thought otherwise ; and when upon the faith of the safe-conduct Knut had been sent back, he was tried before the State Council and magistrates of Stockholm on the 9th of August, 1526, and condemned to death. The sentence was transmitted to the Archbishop of Norway ; but, lest any obstacle should be made to delivering up Sun- nanvader, who had been kept back because too ill to travel, the execution was deferred, and hopes given that the King was not averse to extending his grace to the convict. Accordingly, in the following month, Sunnanvader was sent prisoner to Stockholm. 1 1 Judgment of the State Council over Master Knut, Stockholm, 9th August, 1526, R. R., fol. 91 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 38 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 31. In another account of the trial, Dip. Dal. (666), it is stated that the Council recommended Knut to mercy, but the King answered " that such crimes were not so easy to pardon.' 7 124 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VI. When he drew near the city Archbishop Knut was brought out to meet him, and a mock triumphal entry took place. The two prelates were seated, riding backwards, on half-starved horses, and dressed in ragged episcopal robes. On the head of one was a mitre of bark ; the other wore a crown of straw, and a wooden .half-broken sword. A crowd of masked hirelings followed at their heels, and yelped out insults against them. The procession passed slowly through the principal streets, and halted in the great square of the city, where, while ribald songs were singing, the wretched prisoners were welcomed and pledged in drink by the common hangman. 1 Whatever might be the policy of this proceeding' — though it might effectually intimidate the disaffected ecclesiastics, and lower in the esteem of the populace an order whom the King was determined to depress ; though these and other considerations might be more than a set-off against the dangers arising from the pity and disgust of the right-minded, and the indigna- tion of those still attached to their ancient faith — it is impossible not to regret that the great name of Gus- tavus should have been mixed up with such a deed ; that the form of the most atrocious mockery ever perpetrated upon earth should not have been held too sacred for repetition, from respect to Him who was the object of it ; and that, when from that feel- ing the punishment of the cross had ceased through- out Christendom, the brutalities of Herod and of 1 Celsius, vol. i. p. 308 ; Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 32. Chap. VI. EXECUTION OF THE TWO BISHOPS. 125 Herod's soldiery should have been thus almost to the very letter preserved. 1 Sunnanvader was sent to Upsala for trial. In addition to the judges in the case of the Archbishop, there were added two bishops and the chief persons in the Chapter of Upsala. The lay judges condemned the accused ; the spiritual protested against their jurisdiction. The King gave no heed to their pro- test. Petitions for mercy strongly urged were equally ineffectual. The sentence was carried out at Upsala upon the Bishop of Vesteras in February, 1527, and a few days afterwards upon the Archbishop at Stock- holm. 2 Previous to this, Johannes Magnus, Knut's suc- cessor, had incurred the King's displeasure, both by his hostility to the reformed doctrines, and by his ostentatious display. He had been imprudent enough in those critical times to maintain his state with the pomp of a Wolsey, and with a luxury surpassing that of the King's own court. He visited with a cortege of 200 persons, and among the pages of his house- hold were the sons of some of the chief nobles of the land. 3 The King had rebuked him for this osten- tation, but two circumstances in particular seem to have confirmed his disgrace. He had accompanied 1 The crucifixions at Stockholm during the massacre were a noto- rious and monstrous exception to the custom of the Christian world. — Ziegler, p. 134. 8 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 35. The account of the trial of Sunnan- vader and the execution of both prelates is given, Dip. Dal. (667). 3 Compare Cavendish's Life of Wolsey. 126 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VI. the King to a meeting near Upsala, in which the latter had in vain attempted to convince the people that there were too many monks in the country, and that they were no better than a race of vermin, de- vouring the fruits of the earth ; and that it was an unreasonable thing to pray in Latin since they did not understand Latin. 1 The meeting took place in May, 1526, and on their return to Upsala the King complimented the Archbishop by placing a wreath of flowers round his head, addressing him as Mai- Grefve, Count of May, and agreeing to partake of the hos- pitalities which he provided in that capacity. The offence then given was that the Archbishop during the entertainment occupied a raised seat on a level with that of the King, and said, while pledging his illustrious visitor, " Our grace drinks to your grace." z It is said that the King answered — " For thy grace and our grace there is not room in the same house, " ? and rose from table amid the smiles of the courtiers, At any rate he was much offended, and his displeasure was increased when the Archbishop gave him no support at a conference with the canons of Upsala, of whom he asked upon what they grounded their right to their large possessions ? Peter Galle answered that they were grants from nobles and others, con- firmed by kings and princes, "But," asked Gus^ 1 Tegel, 1526, 8 Ibid, 8 Rhyzelii Bishopskronika, apud Geijer. But the repartee is no); noticed by the early writers. Celsius says (vol. i. p, 296) that Gus-> tavus showed his displeasure only by silence, Chap. VI. AKCHBISHOP MAGNUS BANISHED. 127 tavus, " what if they were obtained by fraud, by the preaching of purgatory, or such-like cozenage of priests and friars ? Have not kings and princes in that case a right to resume them ? " The Arch- bishop and the rest made no reply ; but the Dean, George Tureson, the son of the High Steward, said boldly, " The gifts confirmed by kings and emperors cannot be filched away without God's curse and eterT nal damnation." ' After being imprisoned, upon suspicion of treason- able practices, in a monastery at Stockholm, the Archbishop was released and allowed to leave the country upon the plea of a mission to Poland. A boat containing his chief treasures having (as he alleged) been lost, the clergy of Roslagen contributed liberally to his outfit, and with what he collected from this and other sources, and with the state papers, out of which he compiled his history, he set sail for Dantzic in the month of October, 1526. He pro- ceeded from that place to Rome, where he died in great poverty in the Hospital of Santo Spirito in 1537, and was buried in the Vatican. 2 1 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 30 ; Celsius, vol. i. p, 297. * Tegel, 1526 ; Hvitfeldt, 1526 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. pp. 31, 32. 128 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. CHAPTER VII. Eight of the State to tax the Church — Bishop Brask's remonstrances — Surrender of Gripsholm convent — Troops quartered on religious houses — Arbitrary measures to raise a revenue — Rebellion in Dalecarlia — The impostor Jb'ns — Treaty between the King and the Dalesmen — Great meeting at Vesteras — The King's purpose to humble the hierarchy — ■ Resolutions of the Bishops — The King's address to the States — His offer of abdication — Pertur- bation of the meeting — His demands acceded to. The attack upon the revenues of the existing Church, its doctrines, and its dignities went on simulta- neously. The man whom the King had chosen for his Chancellor, Lars Anderson, was well able to se- cond him in his projects, and entertained views respecting Church property similar to his own. These the Chancellor pithily expressed to the monks of Vadstena, who complained, it appears, that the Church was compelled to contribute her money to the expenses of the Gothland expedition : " When we speak of the Church's money," he said, with a courteous use of the first person, " we mean the people's." l Gustavus developed his opinions on the subject more gradually. When, in 1523, he borrowed from the churches and monasteries of the kingdom, he pro- 1 " Quando dicimus Ecclesias pecuniam, quid aliud quam pecuniam populi dicimus ?" — Skand. Handling, 17 del., s. 206, apud Geijer. Chap. VII. TAXES LEVIED ON THE CHURCH. 129/ mised, as we have seen, repayment as soon as the exchequer should be in better circumstances. When Johannes Magnus remonstrated with him on the subject of the said loan he replied, "with tears," that no one could be more unwilling than himself to im- pose such burthens on the Church, but necessity com- pelled him. 1 After the lapse of two years, however, though he still pleads necessity to excuse the appro- priation clauses with which the decrees of every fresh meeting of the States wer,e now accompanied, it is no longer in the melting mood that the plea is urged, there is no longer any talk of repayment, and the right of the State to tax the Church, for the protec- tion afforded it, is pretty strongly insisted upon ; while in 1526 and 15.27 the proposition that all Church property is public property is laid down as broadly -as by the Chancellor himself. At a State meeting, held in Stockholm in January, 1525, the King submitted that, in the actual state of the kingdom — the Dales- men unsettled, and Christian attempting to recover his dominions by force — it was necessary to keep up the army. On the other hand, with the silver and copper mines unproductive, and the revenues of the Crown generally diminished, he (the King) could not 1 " Locutus sum Majestati suae de gravamine ecelesiarum, &c. ; respondit profusis lachrymis," &c. — Letter to Bishop Brask, 1st Aug. 1523, apud Geijer (vol. ii. p. 52), who seems to doubt whether the tears recorded were actually shed, because Gustavus in his letter to Bishop , Brask on the same subject expresses himself in a tone so different. He omits, however, to give the date of the last letter, and to make sufficient allowance for the effect of time upon the King's sensibility. K 130 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. maintain and pay it ; much less could the people be oppressed with new imposts for the purpose. It was decreed, therefore, that the tithes, with the exception of so much as should be necessary for wax-lights and the general service of the altar, should be appropriated to the pay of the troops. The cavalry, also — seeing that the horses could not in the actual state of affairs be sent to grass for the summer — were to be quartered upon the monasteries. 1 It was upon this occasion that Bishop Brask wrote to the King counselling him "not to appropriate the Church tithes to secular uses, nor to introduce foreign customs, such as quar- tering troops upon religious houses, the rather that the monasteries in Sweden were not, as was often the case abroad, endowed from crown lands, but from private property, so that the King had not the smallest right to meddle with them, neither had any previous monarch ventured to do so." Gustavus an- swered that "he saw no better way of supplying the necessities of the State, but should be glad if the Bishop could suggest any ; that, he must be aware, foreign customs were not necessarily pernicious, nd that it might well be permitted to borrow such as reason and necessity required." " You know well," he continued, " that necessity has no law ; besides, can it be doing God service to feed a parcel of licen- tious hypocrites ? or do I sin against him when, at their expense, I take measures for the peace and 1 Tegel, 1525. Chap. VII. APPROPRIATION OF TITHES. 131 safety of the kingdom ? As to the Crown not having contributed to the foundation of the religious houses, we will inquire into that matter, but our poor wit cannot comprehend how the land which is now freed should not once have been tributary, nor that it should have been freed without the usual conditions of ser- vice to the Crown. Setting this aside, however, every honest man's conscience tells him that in time of need all ought to contribute who would have their goods protected, whether they be monks or priests, monasteries or churches." ' At another meeting, at Vadstena, in January, 1526, a coronation-tax was imposed, to be levied in kind, with the option of commuting it for money after a given rate ; and " seeing that this burthen was to be borne by the people, and that they had derived the smallest share of advantage from the public debt," it was resolved that two-thirds of the Church tithes gathered that winter should be appropriated to its liquidation ; moreover, that the ecclesiastics, like the nobles, should maintain six men-at arms for every 200 marcs rent upon their fiefs, and for the payment of the debt should contribute 15,000 marcs, to be divided among the several dioceses. At the same meeting the King confirmed the old privileges of the nobles, conferred others upon them, and permitted them to redeem that portion of their patrimony which had passed into the hands of the Church since Charles 1 Bishop's Letter, apud Bruzelium, p. 258. K 2 132 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. Knutson's inquest. He himself put in his claim to the convent of Gripsholm. 1 " You see," said Bishop Brask, on this occasion, to his brother prelates, " the fruits of your remissness. Our ruin is at hand, and you yourselves have helped it on. The King, with- out a single remonstrance from you, has taken one step after another to overthrow our religion. He has Lutheran priests in his palace, preaching daily that our fall is near. He has attacked our monasteries, and you have consented to his deeds. He has al- lowed priests to marry ; he has in your very presence subjected our faith to examination. Now he snatches away our revenues, and you look on dismayed." 2 Well might they ! for drawn up against them were state-necessity, and a determined will, and an almost absolute power, and they themselves were not so strong in truth and righteousness as not to blench before the formidable array. They did their best, however, to defeat the measures which they dared not openly resist. In a letter to Magnus Brynteson, of the 20th of March, 1526, the King complained that the Bishops had taken their own share of the tithes be- fore they had made known to the farmers the decree for appropriating two-thirds to the liquidation of the 1 Tegel, 1526. He claimed Gripsholm on the ground that it had been obtained from his father by a forced consent, " ignorans " (says Messenius sarcastically) " a suo contribute Canute Ionse anno 1404 sub coronam esse venditum." — Scond. Illust., torn. i. p. 28. s Celsius, vol. i. p. 291. Chap. VII. SURRENDER OF GRIPSHOLM CONVENT. 133 debt, and had at the same time advised them to de- clare that, except the King accepted a very moderate composition in lieu of the share so appropriated, they should be unable to sow their fields that season. 1 Prior to any formal decision upon the King's claim to Gripsholm the monks surrendered their convent in a document which Gustavus himself probably assisted them in compiling. " We, the undersigned monks of Gripsholm, hereby testify that, having considered that the foun- dation of our convent cannot be so fully maintained but that it must be always open to be protested against by the heirs, who in that foundation suffered injury, and that we cannot with a good conscience re- tain what belongs to another, and what we did not altogether honestly come by ; and finding moreover in the said foundation that, if the convent could not be maintained, then Gripsholm and its appurtenances should return to the rightful heir — in conformity with which our most gracious and beloved sovereign Lord Gustavus, who is the nearest heir, has laid claim to the said convent before his state -council, where we fully expect that justice will be done ; and that we might not travel about not knowing where to go when we should be here deprived, his Grace offered us Juleta convent, where there is as good a revenue and as good opportunities for fishing as. at Gripsholm ; still for many reasons we were unwilling to go there, more especially because we feared that we should not 1 Biks. Reg., fol. 39 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 19. 134 aUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. long remain there without a protest from the brethren of that order ; — wherefore we besought his Grace that we might provide for ourselves, each of us near our -friends where we formerly had been, which his Grace was pleased to grant, and even more ; so that, had there been any among us who could not depend upon that provision, if he liked to remain to celebrate masses, &c, his Grace was content that he should remain there, and have his suitable maintenance with food and clothing ; and seeing that there was at that time (when the debt was paid) little money from which we could be properly sent forth on our journey, so as to have something in hand at the end of it, we agreed withi his Grace to provide each according to his needs with clothes and money, and, that his Grace might be repaid, we made over to him all the pro- perty mortgaged to the convent, or bought to sell again. All this his Grace has done, and brought us each to his native town, so that we give him thanks and acknowledge ourselves always his Grace's humble chaplains and loyal subjects as long as we live ; and if through misunderstanding of the affair any evil report should arise against his Grace in consequence of this proceeding, we pledge our honour and Christian faith that we will repel it, and defend his Grace as we ho- nestly may, well knowing that his Grace has a good right to recover the inheritance which was take/p^^by force from his father. " For further witness that it has been so agreed be- tween his Grace and us, and that we stand pledged Chap. VII. TROOPS QUARTERED ON CONVENT'S. 135 as aforesaid, we invite the worthy father, Master Magnus, Bishop elect of Strengness, and the noble Michael Nilson of Erness, to join their seals with our convent's seal to this deed, which we also all, each for himself, subscribe with our own hands." 1 Gustavus despatched a copy of this deed to the Dales, Westgothland, Eastgothland, and Smaland, with some prefatory remarks of his own, on the 6th of April, 1526. Before the convent was cleared he wrote to the commandant, whom he had placed there, to send him the society's money-chest, but so secretly that the monks should know nothing - of the matter. 2 To retaliate upon the Bishops their attempts to evade his claims and diminish his authority, he quartered his cavalry this summer also upon the Abbess of Vreta, telling her, that she might not have a double burthen, he would arrange with the Bishops that her tenants should not be required to take in .their horses. 3 In July the same year he gave the Prior of Eskiltuna, as long as he should be willing to entertain the Kjng's troops, the privilege of sending his monks out to beg for the benefit of the convent, " no leave asked of the Bishop on any other." In December he permitted a Dominican monk to quit his convent and order, and gave him a full protec- tion. To the Bishop of Linkoping, who, keeping a strict eye upon the Church property in his diocese, 1 Riks. Reg., fol. 43. ; Thysel., vol. i. p. 27. s Thys., vol. i. p. 30. 3 Riks. Reg. 1526, fol. 55 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 32. 136 QUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. had caused an inventory to be taken of the property belonging to the monastery of Nydala, he wrote on the 29th of August in these terms : — " We understand that you have ordered your Pro- vost to take an account of the possessions of Nydal convent, from the least to the greatest, and we marvel much what can be your object in that proceeding, for you must recollect that, when the aid was last decreed at Stockholm, we excepted the monasteries, wishing ourselves to arrange with them. We are informed, too, that you claim the jus patronat&s, but we do not understand how you make it out : we have not learned that your ancestors founded the said convent ; and, even though your predecessors, the Bishops, should have founded it, if it was from their own inheritance and possessions, it belongs then to their family, and not to you ; if from the revenues of the Church, which is probable, then you have little to do with the matter, for then it was founded from the wealth col- lected by the people, who are under our rule and go- vernment, and not under yours. It is not for you, therefore, to make any change there without consult- ing us ; and however great a. jus patronatfis you may have thereto, it appears to us that we were somewhat slighted herein, when , you knew that we ourselves wished to deal with the monasteries. We are in- formed also of the gold monstrance which you have taken from Cronbeck. It belongs to our family, and we should like to know what has become of it." l 1 Eiks. Reg. 1526, fol. 128 ; Thya., vol. i. p. 42. Chap. VII. RIGOROUS FINANCIAL MEASURES. 137 o To the Bishop and Chapter of Abo he wrote on the 23rd of the same month : — " We fully expected that you would have con- sulted us before you proceeded to choose a Dean, and had therefore ground enough for annulling the elec- tion, had we been minded to act with severity against you ; however, to please you, we are content that the said election shall stand, providing that you, either from the said deanery, or from some other prebend, send into our chancery 200 marcs a-year, for the main- tenance of a good man in our palace (gard) ; for you are well aware that there are some dignitaries from the other cathedrals in our said palace, and that they are here quite as useful as they can be at the cathe- drals, and that there is here as much, and more, to arrange for the public good than is there possible." l Under the same date he issued an authority to the Bishop and Chapter of the same See, for altering the late Dean's will. Probably some other religious cor- poration, if not the Chapter itself, had been made residuary legatee. " We, Gustavus, &c, hereby testify that it has been made known to us how the good man Jacob, Dean of Abo, has left a large sum of money, which he has bequeathed in his will according to his pleasure ; but it is evident to any one who will duly consider the matter, that the said money could have been much better disposed of, than he has disposed of it ; that is to say, that the greatest part of it might have been 1 Riks. Reg. 1526, fol. 127 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 40. 138 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. applied to the public benefit, considering the burthen now lying upon the country, through the heavy debt occasioned by the war, which has been now a long time waged against King Christian. We therefore enjoin the Bishop and Chapter of Abo to modify the said will according to our ideas, which we have already partly explained to his executors, so that, while his heirs, relations, and the poor, get the share that is given them, the rest may be applied, as far as it will go, to the payment of the debt ; when that is done, we acquit his executors of all further claim from those interested in the said will, who- soever they may be." 1 These arbitrary proceedings on the part of the King, his severity against the rebel Bishops, the famine which soon after followed, and which the ecclesiastics hailed as a judgment on his head, the heavy taxes and burthens imposed upon the people, awakened murmurs everywhere, and in Dalecarlia a rebellion. A leader offered himself to the Dalesmen in the beginning of the year 1527, who pretended to be the son of the late Regent Sten Sture. The youth whom he personated, it will be remembered, had been sent to Dantzic in 1520, and returned to Calmar at the same time that Gustavus procured the liberation of his mother. It appears that Von Mehlen had made use 1 Swartsjo, 23rd August, 1526 ; R. E., fol. 127 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 41. As early as the year before he had ordered his lieutenant to take steps for securing him the horse and silver stoup of a priest who had died at Munktorp, in the diocese of Vesteras. Chap. VII. THE PRETENDER JONS. 139 of his presence to colour his own treason, and, still keeping up that pretext, had at his departure left in command of the fortress an old officer of the orphan's father. 1 The real Stur£ was, at the time his double appeared first in the Dales, at the court of Gustavus, who, as rumour falsely reported, had attempted his life. This rumour gave rise to the deception. The false Sture pretended that he had escaped from the court of the tyrant, now turned Lutheran or heathen, who could not endure to look upon the rightful heir to the Crown, and whose violence placed his life in constant jeopardy. A soldier of the late Regent, Peter Grym, 2 assisted him in his part, which the rascal performed to perfection. He was the illegitimate son of a cottage wench in Westmanland, considerably older than the real Sture, who was then only sixteen. No one could rightly say who was his father. His proper name was Jons. He had been groom in the service of a nobleman, and when in that capacity had stolen forty marcs ; but he was handsome, fluent, in- ventive, and of consummate assurance. Whenever he spoke of his pretended father, he spoke so well and wept so naturally, that the simple Dalesmen could not choose but weep with him. He thanked them for all the love they had shown his father. He bade them pray for his soul. He entreated that 1 Tegel, 1527. 2 Grym was taken in the Dales, tried at Stockholm in March, 1528, found guilty, and executed. — Dip. Dal. (669). 140 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. he might be his heir in their affections. After making a partial impression in his favour, especially in the three parishes of Mora, Ortsa, and Lexand, he passed into Norway, where he was taken up by the Arch- bishop and the most illustrious persons of the kingdom ; and having formed a court, appointed a chancellor, and issued a coinage, he was by the Archbishop's in- fluence betrothed to the daughter of the Lady Ingerdt, a gentlewoman of large fortune and distinguished family. With the help obtained from Norway he returned to the Dales ; but still opinions were divided, and in Hedemora, Skedari, and Huseby, they both remained true to the King and endeavoured to per- suade the rebellious parishes to abandon the impostor. Christina Gyllenstjerna, at the King's request, wrote to the Dalesmen disowning her pretended son ; but with his habitual effrontery the fellow said, " It was from shame that his mother disowned him, because he was born before marriage." ' After some skirmishing with the King's troops, the rebels came to a parley with the Commissioners whom he had sent to put down the insurrection. The Dalesmen thereupon sent to the King, who was at Upsala, a list of grievances, which he answered seri- 1 Tegel, 1527. The fate of his Chancellor is recorded, Dip. Dal. (668), Stockholm, November 6th, 1527 : — " On the same day was tried a priest named Lauren tius Sigfridi, born here in the city, who had formerly belonged to the convent of Grey Friars. The provost accused him of having sided with the traitor of the Dales (the Daleyunker) and been his chancellor. He then confessed his deeds, and was accordingly condemned, first to the sword and afterwards to the wheel." Chap. VII. COMPLAINTS OP THE DALESMEN. 141 atim with exemplary patience, and sometimes with a quiet pleasantry. To their complaint that there was no coin in cir- culation, but what was comparatively of a high value, he replied the coin in use had been struck to pay the foreign troops, but now that the war was over they should have a small coinage, if only that would content them. They complained that the mint at Vesteras was not at work. He answered that, owing to the falling off of the silver-mines, the mint at Stockholm was sufficient ; if, however, the mines be- came more productive, he would again coin at Ves- teras. To the charge of quartering troops upon con- vents, and imposing heavy imposts, he pleaded neces- sity, and the consent of the States. To the com- plaint that provisions were dear — that he had done his best to cheapen them, and that the graziers were losing money. To their murmur against the new fashion of slashed doublets, he answered that he dis- liked the fashion as much as any one, and should be glad to see it go out : himself and the other great Lords had the most reason to complain of it, as they had to give their retainers and pages more clothes now that they cut them in pieces. They said there was a design of restoring Archbishop Trolle'. No doubt, replied the King, the priests desired this, and the return of King Christian too, and it was well that the common people should understand what they wanted, and not be so ready to follow their treason- able suggestions. They distinctly gave out that peasants would not fight against peasants. The King 142 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. applauded the sentiment, except where any of them would get up a rebellion : in such case not only might peasant fight against peasant, but even brother against brother. They informed the King that there was a great outcry against the Lutheranism preached at Stockholm, and against the psalms and hymns in Swedish which were used there. Gustavus answered that he knew nothing about Lutheranism; he had commanded the preaching of God's pure word, and put a stop to the cozenings and cajoleries of the priesthood, who thereupon had set up a cry of Lu- theranism, meaning thereby not the people's advan- tage but their own. As to the hymns in Swedish, it seemed as reasonable to praise God in our mother- tongue as in Latin, which we do not understand : . however, they sang in Latin in Stockholm now as formerly. 1 The King wondered, moreover, that the good men of the Dales would meddle with things beyond their capacity, which could best be settled by the State-council and learned clerks and prelates- But, no doubt, they had been put up to this by cer- tain priests, who did not wish their own practices to be exposed, and would fain keep them still within their clutches. It were well that they did not trust them too confidently in such matters. 2 He concluded by inviting the Dalesmen to send representatives to the 1 Tegel, 1527. Geijer says, vol. ii. p. 62, that the Latin mass was abolished in the capital in 1525 ; but certain portions at least had teen retained or restored. PeringsMold, Scond. Illust., torn. xv. p. 101, speaks doubtfully on the subject : " 1525. Quando prima Suetice Missa Stocholmiaj fuisse dicitur celebrata." a Tegel, 1527. Chap. VII. TREATY WITH THE DALESMEN. 143 "approaching great meeting at Vesteras, except the King meant to obtain, if possible, the sanction of the States for taking more effectual measures against the power of the Church than any upon which he had yet ventured. In the interim it was agreed between the King and the Dalesmen, that they should lay down their arms and abandon the impostor, upon condition that he should be permitted to leave the kingdom unharmed, and that there should be a com- plete oblivion of all that had been attempted in his favour. When the Dalesmen, however, proposed to add to these conditions and stipulations — that the foreign fashions of slashed and particoloured clothes should not be used at court ; that no new faith nor Lutheran doctrine should be introduced ; and that those who ate meat on Good Fridays should be burnt or otherwise put to death, the King's patience and good humour appear to have been well nigh ex- hausted, and he answered " that he did not -mean to be dictated to as to the dress of his household, and with respect to the two last points, he recommended them not to trouble themselves with what they did not understand." The Dalesmen, therefore, were compelled to withdraw these articles, and be content with the rest. 1 When the day appointed for the meeting at Vesteras arrived, the muster was for that age very numerous. There were 4 Bishops, 4 Deans, 15 State-councillors, 129 Nobles, 32 Burghers (exclusive of the Town Council of Stock- 1 Tegel, 3527. 144 G-USTAVUS VASA. Opap. VII". holm, who were present and had a considerable influ- ence upon the proceedings), 14 Bergsmen, and 105 Peasants from all parts of the kingdom, with the exception of the Dales, from whence the promised deputies did not appear, and from Finland, from whence none appear to have been summoned, though the resolutions of the meeting were accepted there as in the rest of the kingdom. The nobles came armed, by the King's desire. He reckoned upon their support in striking the decisive blow which he meditated. 1 Gustavus opened the session on the Sunday before Midsummer-day with a magnificent banquet, and now appeared an unequivocal sign of his purpose to degrade the higher orders of the Church. The in- dignities offered to Knut and Sunnanvader might seem to have been prompted by their repeated treasons ; the insults heaped upon Johannes Magnus to have been the reward of his personal vanity and folly ; but now the King was determined that there should be no mistake ; now the whole hierarchy was to be humbled ; and whereas before they were wont to sit in the highest places — the Bishops even above the Regent of the kingdom — the place now assigned them was below the State-council and the chief of the nobility. 2 ' Geijer, vol. ii. p. 67. ! Johannes Magnus says of the elder Shire", " Pontifices sacerdotes Christi tanta veneratione prosequebatur ut se nunquam — quamvis tot populorum princeps esset — praetulerit infimo Pontifioi ; immo inter pios et prseclaros mores asstimabat, minores ecclesiae prselatos, ut pote Pra- Chap. VII. ASSEMBLY AT VESTBRAS. 145 The insulted order met the next day in the Church of St. Egidius, with bolted doors, to brood over the omen. Its purport (said Bishop Brask) was evident. It was the signal of the King's intention to take from them their revenues and castles, and degrade them to the level of mere parish priests. But to this — if they were wise — they would never give their concurrence. If indeed the King employed force to strip them of their possessions, there was no help for it ; but let it not be with their consent. Many kings had attempted what Gustavus was now attempting, but had been de- stroyed by the thunders of the Church. Let them then remain true to the Pope, and they like others would in due time have their own again ; but if they stood not up for the Church's privileges, the Pope would excommunicate them, and the King would look upon them as no better than serfs and cowards. These arguments prevailed over the more timid or more moderate counsels of the Bishops of Vesteras and Strengness, who said, that if they had little to receive they should have little to spend, and pro- fessed themselves willing to submit to the King's pleasure. At Brask's suggestion the assembled dignitaries signed a paper, in which they pledged themselves to protect the Church's rights, to be true to the Pope, never to adopt the Lutheran doctrines, and to wait with patience a change in the government. They positos, Deoanos, et similes, primas sedes nedum in templis sed in prsetoriis, et aliis publicis locis eis concedere." — Lib. 23. L 146 GUSTAVUS VASA. ' Chap. VII. hid the document under the floor of the church, where fifteen years afterwards it was discovered. The business of the meeting, which was held in the great hall of the Dominican convent, commenced by a report of the King, read on his behalf by the Chancellor. The King, after thanking the States for having come at so much cost and trouble to the council, which for weighty reasons he had appointed, recalled to their recollection the earlier years of his govern- ment. He reminded them that " at Vadstena he had offered to resign the Regency; but finding that no one would undertake the office, he had conducted it in God's name, and to the best of the ability which God had given him. Observing the state of the kingdom at that time — Stockholm, Calmar, Steke- borg, and Finland being still in the hands of the enemy — he had been obliged to crave assistance from foreign lands, especially from Lubeck and the other Hanse towns. It was no easy thing, owing to Chris- tian's connexion with the Emperor and the Mar- grave, to obtain what he wanted ; but they had supplied him, at no small cost, with what he required of troops and arms, and the debt still remained alto- gether unliquidated. After the surrender of Stock- holm, the nobles and people had chosen him King, and promised him all loyal support and obedience ; and though he had made great opposition, chiefly owing to the unsteadiness which the Swedes were wont to observe in regard to their princes, and for fear the same game would be played with him as Chap. VII. HIS ADDRESS TO THE STATES. 147 with the others, yet, partly because he was then young, and believed the oaths and promises which they then made him on behalf of the whole kingdom, and partly because he thought that the Swedes, taught by past bitter experience, would thenceforth avoid disunion and conspiracies, and not hastily attempt any change, he had given his consent; of which he had often since repented. Who could rule a people that, as soon as a crime was punished, passed from hand to hand the signal for revolt ? Who especially could rule the Dalesmen, who took every traitor under their protection, upon which these of course always counted, and so did what they pleased ? Why should they be thus privileged, more than others, to disturb the peace of the kingdom ? They complained indeed of the imposts which followed each other year after year ; but the foreign war, and the internal disturbances of the kingdom, had occa- sioned them. Moreover, none had been levied with- out the consent of the State Council, or contrary to law. He had generally to thank the people that they were unwilling he should break his promise to the German towns. Why were the Dalesmen only indifferent ? Why should they claim a greater freedom to rebel than the other good men of the kingdom ? They boasted, forsooth, that they had placed his Grace on the throne — though after the victory at Vesteras, where the liberation was begun, but by no means completed, most of them went home again. Now they pretend that everything was done by l 2 148 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. them; now they want to appoint and dismiss whom they please, and swaggeringly claim greater privileges than others, as if, in comparison with them, they were serfs and slaves. The German legates were there to demand their money. Let the Dalesmen and their abettors come and see whether they were content to be paid in rebellions. They laid to his charge the dearness of salt, of corn, and cloth — which he had done his best to cheapen — as if he were a god, and everything were in his power. They complained that he had quartered troops on towns and convents, as if necessity did not justify unusual measures. They cried out that he had pillaged monasteries and churches, which merely meant that assistance had been obtained of them to lighten the burthens of the people ; but this too had been with the consent of the State Council, and might well be, seeing that the people had accumulated this wealth, and that it was their own. It was imputed to him that he was bring- ing in a new religion, only because he and many more had found out how they had been deceived, and in many things oppressed, by the ecclesiastics, who exalt the Pope of Rome. The rulers of the kingdom had been too long obliged to put up with the insults of warlike and turbulent prelates, such as Gustavus Ti'olle, who had threatened to use sharper weapons against Sten Sture than book and candle. The Eegent could support only 500 soldiers from the resources of the state, because the Crown and nobles had only a third part of the landed property, while Chap. VII. HIS ADDRESS TO THE STATES. 149 priests or monks, churches or convents, had all the rest. He confessed that he permitted the preaching of God's word and gospel, and some of the preachers were here ready to defend their doctrine ; the prelates of the Church, however, would not listen to them, but relied upon ancient custom, right or wrong. It was falsely and shamelessly said of him that he wanted no priests in the country ; he hoped to die a Christian ; he knew that teachers could not be dis- pensed with, and he wished to place them every- where, providing they did their duty ; but with re- spect to those, who did not perform their functions for the public good, he should consult the States. For his part, he was ready to abdicate his throne, take a fief instead, and thank them for the honour they had done him ; but if Sweden would have a king, he must have means to support his power. The new style of warfare which had arisen in other countries demanded larger outlays : the fortresses of the kingdom were in decay or ruin; the King's revenues were withheld, when every man was lord of his own castle. Besides the nobles were so impo- verished, that they could not fulfil their obligation of protecting the realm, and were continually asking, and no wonder, for new fiefs. The customs had vanished, the silver and copper mines fallen off, food for the towns had failed, and for the miserable re- mains of trade town and country squabbled with each other. Such evils demanded a medy, who- soever was to rule over the kingdom." 150 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. When this address had been read, and the King had demanded an answer of the nobles and bishops, Ture Johnson, the senior of the Council, who the year before had been made High Steward, requested that Bishop Brask might be allowed to give his opinion. The Bishop thereupon said, " that he was well aware of the allegiance which he owed the King ; but he and all his order were equally bound to obey the Pope in things spiritual, and that without his con- currence he could not consent to any change of doc- trine, nor to any diminishing of the Church's rights and possessions. If unscrupulous priests had sought to enrich themselves, by working upon the supersti- tions of the laity — a course which the heads of the Church themselves condemned — let such cases be proved and punished." The King asked the State councillors and nobles if this reply seemed to them sufficient. Ture John- son said that he could not but think that the Bishop's answer was in the main right, though not a complete reply to all that the King had brought forward. " Then," said Gustavus, " I desire no longer to be your king. We had anticipated another answer ; but we cannot marvel that the common people show us so much disobedience and discontent, when they have such abettors here. If rain fails thein they blame us,' — if sunshine fails them they do the same. Comes there famine, pestilence, we are made respon- sible. Ye would all fain be our masters. You place monks and priests, and the creatures of the Pope, Ohap. VII. TENDERS HIS ABDICATION. 151 over our head ; and for all our labour on your behalf, the only recompence we have to look for is, that we should with your good will lay down our head upon the scaffold, though not one of you would bell the cat as we have done. Who upon such conditions would be your king ? Not the most wretched in hell, much less any human being. Therefore choose another king ; and if you can find one to please you in all things and at all times, we shall rejoice. Only you must remember to dismiss us from the kingdom with honesty, and repay us all that we have expended for it out of our own funds, and from our paternal and maternal inheritance. Let that be done, and then we promise you to leave the country and return no more." The King here burst into tears, and left the hall. When he was gone a deep silence reigned through- out the assembly. At last the Chancellor came for- ward, and invited them, in the great difficulty in which they were placed, to offer up their united prayers to God for his guidance. He said, " We have only this alternative, to choose either to follow the King, as he has proposed, and entreat him to carry on the government, or to pay him what he has ex- pended for the State, and choose another king." They were, however, too much confounded at the scene they had witnessed to determine anything that day. Ture Johnson alone put on an appearance of courage, and, as he marched to his lodging to the sound of the drum, exclaimed, " I defy any one to make me 152 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. Lutheran, heretic, or heathen this year." But when the next day the meeting would decide nothing, some of the peasants grew impatient, and said, if all things were well considered, Gustavus had done them no injury, and that, unless the nobles soon settled something, they should take the matter into their own hands. The merchants and shopkeepers sup- ported the peasants, and the burghers W Stockholm declared that at any rate they should hW that city for the King's behoof. 1 Magnus Sommar^ishop of Strengness, declared finally that the ministers of the Church wished not to be so protected as theseby to leave the kingdom a prey to their most inveterate enemies. Many thanked him for his speech, and said they would have no king but Gustavus, an\ prayed that they might hear the disputed points of* the two religions discussed in their presence, so that even laymen might have some light upon the subject. Olaus Petri and Peter Galle accordingly argued together until late in the day ; the latter in Latin,, until the threats of the peasants — who, if they liked Latin prayers, did not like Latin speeches — compelled him to speak Swedish. In the mean time the King held his court at the Castle, surrounded by his military staff, and, as if careless of the issue, passed his time in various di- versions. On the third day the burghers and peasants said 1 The King rewarded their zeal by a confirmation of their privileges on the 28th June. — Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 39. Chap. VII. CONSENTS TO EETAIN THE CROWN. 153 to the nobles that, if they chose to be the occasion of their and the kingdom's ruin, they would try, with the King's help, to punish and ruin them, and that they had already sent a message to the King, ac- quainting him with their resolution. Upon this the nobles of Westgothland, and especially Magnus Brynteson (Liliehok), entreated Ture Johnson not to oppose the King so rigidly, "for much ill might come of it ;" to which Johnson replied, " that he was willing this time to give in to the King, provided he did not lead him into any heresy." Lars Anderson and Olaus Petri were now sent off to entreat Gustavus still to hold the reins of govern- ment. They were met with a short and sharp re- fusal, and on their return prayed that, if any further communication were to be made to the King, it might be by other messengers. Knut Anderson and the Bishop of Strengness then undertook the task, but came back unsuccessful. After this the anxiety became intense. Deputation after deputation was sent to the castle, entreating, with tears, that the King would at least honour them with his presence. For a long while he still held out, and, when he at length relented, he sent a mes- sage, saying that he could not meet the States that day, but would do so on the day following. At the appointed time he appeared in the hall of assembly, accompanied by the State Council and a splendid life-guard. The joy was now proportionate to the previous anxiety ; the common people were ready to 154 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VII. kiss his feet, and the three estates of nobles, burghers, and peasants, with one voice sanctioned all his de- mands. 1 1 The account of this important meeting I have taken chiefly from Tegel, 1527. — Vide etiam Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 38; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 68, Chap. VIII. DECREES OF VESTEEls. 155 CHAPTER VIII. Decrees of Vester&s — Uncontrolled power over Church property given to Gustavus — Privileges of the clergy curtailed — Public decla- ration of the States — Opposition and death of the Bishop of Linkdping — Surrender of tithes — Complaint to Gustavus of non- fulfilment by him of part of the Ordinances — Evacuation and ' destruction of monasteries — Downfall of the monastic system, and its consequences — Nicolaus Amundi, a monk of Vadstena — Diary of Vadstena convent. Gustavus had played a game in which he had staked his throne against the wealth and power of the clergy, but the odds had been well calculated, and he had won the cast. The decrees of the memorable meet- ing at Vesteras, dated Midsummer-day, 1527, placed the property of the Church, and all its offices, com- pletely in the King's power. The first of these decrees, which was called ' Vester&s Recess,' provided that the revenues of the Church should thenceforward be made available to increase the revenues of the Crown ; that the Bishops should " ride with only so many attendants " — in other words, should have only such income — as the King should prescribe ; that they should agree with him as to the proportion of their revenues to be paid him, and should give up the castles and fortresses which they then held ; that a similar composition should be made with the Deans 156 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. and Canons of the several cathedrals ; and, " seeing that in those monasteries which were supported by rent from lands there had been for a long time a relaxed discipline, chiefly from their having had feeble superiors, so that the monasteries were falling into decay, and their lands lying waste," it was decreed that the King should assign them to his nobles, to provide out of the rents for the support of the reli- gious orders, and to reserve the surplus for the ser- vice of the Crown ; that the Bishops should not interfere with the management of the monasteries, nor burthen them with guests ; and that, when they came to officiate at the consecration of nuns, the King's lieutenant should determine with what retinue they should be accompanied. It provided, more- over, that lands alienated since Charles Knutson's inquest should be recovered, for less or more, accord- ing as they had been for a longer or shorter time alienated, if only the claimants could establish their right in the proper court before a jury and in the presence of the defendants, and that the nobles should moderate their demands upon the King in consequence of this privilege, and render service to the Crown for the possessions which they might recover. The limit 1454 to be applicable only to those lands (frdlsejord) upon which no quit- rent had been reserved ; lands paying a quit-rent (skattSjord) to be recoverable after any period of alienation. 1 1 Tegel, 1527. Chap. VIII. DECREES OP VESTEEAS. 157 The appendix to the Recess, called ' Vesteras Ordi- nantia,' included the following provisions : — That the Bishops should fill up the vacant bene- fices ; but if they should appoint murderers, drunk- ards, or such as should be unable to preach God's word, that these might be displaced, and others of the King's appointment substituted. That of the money taken for Church censures an account should be kept, and that neither the Bishop nor his officers should be so ready as hereto- fore to inflict those censures upon trifling occasions. That the fines for fornication, &c, should be paid to the King, and not to the Bishop. That no fines should be taken for working on Saints' days. That the Bishops should render the King an account of their revenues, that he might settle what proportion they should retain, and how much pay for the King's behoof. That the clergy should plead and be impleaded, in secular matters, before the temporal courts, and that their former temporal jurisdiction should be abo- lished. That the property of deceased clergymen should fall to their lawful heirs, not to the Bishops. That the mendicant friars, " seeing that in truth they carry through the country many deceptions and lies," should leave their convents only for ten weeks in the year, five in the summer and five in the winter ; and should take from the Provost, or Burgomaster, a pass when they left their convents, and appear before them on their return. That monks who had 158 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. other resources should not go out to beg. That sick persons should not be forced by the priests to make a will. That the clergy should not withhold the sacrament at Easter, or at any other time, for debts due to themselves. Finally, that the Gospel should be taught in all schools, "as well it may, seeing that they are schools for Christians." ' The secular orders of the States endeavoured to reconcile the people to the decrees by a public decla- ration of their object, bearing the date of the meeting. The monasteries having fallen into decay through the feeble government of incompetent superiors, they had permitted the King to put a good .man to govern them, and to find for the monks and nuns a suitable maintenance, that divine service might not go down. They had lessened the power of the Bishops, and thus made them less formidable to the Crown, and their revenues would render the King's calls upon the people for help less frequent. They deprecated the idea that either the King or themselves wished to get rid of Bishops ; they only wished them to be less powerful, that they might the better set forth God's word. They observed at the same time, that the new preachers, for protecting whom the King was so much blamed, "preached only the pure Gospel which the Holy Fathers preached, who first brought Chris- tianity into the country." The prelates, who after that day were not again summoned to the States-meetings, did not sign the 1 Tegel, 1527. Chap.^VIII. BISHOP BKASK'S OPPOSITION. 159 decrees, but in a separate act declared that they would not oppose what had been agreed to so unani- mously, and that, however rich or poor his Grace would have them to be, they were content. When the decrees were signed, Tynnelso castle was demanded by the King from the Bishop of Strengness, who surrendered it without opposition. The Bishop of Skara in like manner gave up the fortress of Lacko, not venturing to object. But when the King turned to the Bishop of Linkoping, and asked him to surrender the castle of Munkeboda (now Norsholm), he was met with a silence which did not imply consent; and Ture Johnson's prayer, that in consideration of the advanced age of the Bishop he might be allowed to retain the fortress till his death, was answered by a decided refusal. The King now not only demanded the immediate sur- render, but that the Bishop should not leave the town until the castle were in the hands of the appointed commissioners. Forty of his retainers were called forward on the spot, and made to pass into the service of the Crown, and he himself was compelled to find sureties that neither he nor his adherents should attempt anything against the peace of the kingdom. 1 It is no small proof of the consideration in which this prelate was held by the chief of the nobility, that eight members of the State-council consented to be bound on his behalf. The events of that day told upon none of the Church dignitaries with greater > Tegel, 1527 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 38 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 75. 160 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. bitterness than upon him. A firm and even bigoted Churchman, jealous for the authority of his order, jealous for his own prerogatives, and severe in the vindication of both, he appears to have discharged the duties of his episcopal office with a dignity and diligence suitable to his commanding abilities and to the general respectability of his character. But the system which he had adorned and defended — after his manner — was broken in pieces. His own power had passed away. The wealth which he had employed in importing into his country the literature, the arts, and sciences of more enlightened realms had been given to another. Nothing, as he thought, rer mained to him but to fly from a scene every object of which was fraught with bitter recollections, and to seek for sympathy and succour in some happier land. The great obstacle to this project was the bail which the King had compelled him to give for his loyal behaviour; but from this he soon contrived to set himself free. Gustavus having come to Linkoping, the Bishop prepared for him there a splendid enter- tainment, and received him with so much cheerful- ness and seeming cordiality, that the King released him from his sureties, and gave him a full and com- plete pardon and assurance of favour under hand and seal. 1 Having regained the confidence of his sove- reign, the Bishop suggested that it would be a pity should the spiritual sway of Sweden over Gothland 1 Tegel, 1527. The deed is dated " Vadstena, August 2, 1527."— Kiks. Keg., fol. 253 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 105. Chap. VIII. DEPABTURE AND DEATH OF BRASK. 161 be lost together with the temporal, and prayed that he might be allowed to make a visitation in the island in order to avert the double calamity. The King, suspecting no ulterior design, gave his consent, when the Bishop, gathering from the cathedrals, monas- teries, and parish churches all the gold and silver he could extract from them, embarked with it at Soder- koping and set sail for Gothland. On his arrival there he added to his store, and from thence con- veyed himself and his accumulated treasure to a convent in Dantzic. 1 At this point he almost disap- pears as a prominent personage from the stage of history. We hear, indeed, of two cutters fitted out by him, of divers letters written by him, and of an intrigue in which he participated for transferring the Crown of Sweden from Gustavus to a Catholic prince. But in quitting the post of danger, he had quitted in a great degree the post of influence, and verified the law, that the fruits of critical opportu- nities belong to those only who are at hand, and on the alert, to seize them. 2 He died in the convent of Leuda, in Poland, on his way to Italy, in 1538, having left to his countrymen many suggestions in worldly matters, which, while they wisely neglected his spiritual counsels, they, and their descendants long afterwards, found it to their advantage to carry out. 3 1 Tegol, 1527. 8 " tpiffet 8* virdpxei to7s irapovfft t« twc amWaw, «ol tois 49e\ovtri irovetv «al Ka/ftwefaw tb twv a/i.e\oivTuv."— Demosthenis Philipp., I., torn, iv., Orat. Attioi, p. 46, ed. Bekker. 3 Tegel, 1527. He was elected to the see of Linkoping in 1513 (Diar. Vadst.) ; upon which occasion the chronicler, instead of the M 162 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. Immediately after the congress at Vesteras the result of its deliberations was published throughout the kingdom, and Gustavus sent commissioners to the principal churches and monasteries to take charge of all documents relative to their estates and revenues. The tithes under the old regime had been divided into three equal parts, one of which was allotted to the incumbent. The remaining two-thirds again underwent a tripartite division, of which one share, called the Bishop's tithe, was allotted to the diocesan; a second, called the Church tithe, was applied to the maintenance of the fabric and the celebration of divine service in the parish church; the remaining share, which was appropriated originally to the main- tenance of the poor, and had thence been called the Poor's-tithe, after it had been diverted to the use of the canons in the cathedrals changed its name in ac- cordance with its new application. The church and canons' tithes were now at once claimed for the ser- vices of the state, with the exception of certain measures (tunnor) of corn reserved to the parish church under the name of Church-wine-and-building- grain. The bishops, for some time after the decree had passed, paid a certain toll out of their tithe to the Crown, but finally surrendered it, and received instead a stated income.' Many of the monasteries were granted as fiefs to different nobles, upon con- dition of supporting the monks and nuns, and paying " Deo gratias" with which he hails an election thoroughly satisfactory, adds to his record, " Utinam ad Dei laudem." 1 Bruzelii Hist., p. 269. A tunna=2 spanns =4-H Winchester hushels. Chap. V1I1. SUERENDBE OP TITHES. 1 63 a rent to the Crown from the surplus revenues : in some cases the abbots were permitted to remain at the head of their convents upon similar conditions. 1 The article of the ordinances at Vesteras, however, which provided for the maintenance of the existing members of the religious houses, " that they might serve and praise God," was kept very imperfectly. The States assembled at Upsala in 1528 complained to Gustavus that, instead of observing that article, he had induced monks and nuns to leave their convents and to marry, and had expelled others, whose conduct had been reprehensible, instead of leaving them to the chastisement of their ecclesiastical superiors. In the following year Gustavus denied that he had, either personally or by his officers, made any expulsions, except in the case of some foreign monks ; but the denial was still further qualified by the addition that, " if either he or they had done so, they would answer for it ; he hoped, however, that no such case would be proved." 2 Notwithstanding this denial it cannot be doubted that certain devices, savouring more or less of com- pulsion, were occasionally made use of to accelerate the slow processes of time and death, and give the King an earlier possession of some of the monasteries, than the decrees of Vesteras had contemplated. There was a good deal of variety in the mode of 1 Thus in August of this year a composition was made with the ahbot of Alvastra and with the ahbess and convent of Vadstena. — Thys., vol. i. pp. 117, 118. Tegel, 1529. H 2 164 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. operation. Thus in August, 1527, the nuns of St. Clara at Stockholm, being formally summoned, eva- cuated their convent, which was then pulled down, on the plea that it afforded shelter to an enemy be- sieging the capital. They found, however, an asylum in the Franciscan convent, which had probably lost its inmates. 1 In the following month the Dominicans were reduced by famine. When they complained that they had no means of subsistence they were ad- vised to seek it elsewhere, " seeing that hunger made men give up towns and castles, much more mo- nasteries." 2 Soon after their convent was levelled to the ground, and the site converted into a royal garden. 3 In the summer of 1528 the monks of Ves- teras surrendered by capitulation, the prior being made dean of the cathedral, and "those who were fit" appointed to parochial churches in the country : the rest seem to have been left without provision. 4 In respect to the inmates of other monasteries, some quitted voluntarily, some with an unwilling willing- ness. Under one or other of these conditions the Franciscans of Ionkoping deserted their convent, which was afterwards first made use of as an hotel for lepers and then as a powder manufactory. 5 It may well be permitted us to rejoice over the downfall of the monastic system in Sweden. Apart 1 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 40. 8 Stockholm's Stad's Tankebok, v. Troil ; Handlingar, 2 Del. s. 283, apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 77. 8 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 40. ■> Tegel, 1528. 5 Scond. Illust., torn. v. Chap. VIII. PALL OF MONASTIC SYSTEM. 165 from the superstitions with which that system in the Roman Catholic Church is practically combined, it is a system ill suited, generally speaking, to the frailty of human nature. It is dangerous to some even of those who adopt it from the compunctious visitings of conscience, or from the enthusiasm of religious feeling. It is a most perilous snare to all whom a momentary disgust with the world, or the will or persuasion of others, or an indolent temper, induces or compels to embrace it. The discipline of the convents in Sweden in the fourteenth century had been shamefully relaxed. It had called forth the pious zeal of St. Bridget, and given rise to the religious order which bears her name ; l and, without giving too much credit to those sweeping charges which Gustavus was wont to make against such establishments when reproached on their account or about to grasp their possessions, 2 we may 1 " Nunc autem abusioneni in se continent nimis gravem in eo, quod portse indifferenter clericis et laicis, quibus placet sororibus introitum dare, etiam in ipsis noctibus sunt apertas. Et ideo talia loca similiora sunt lupanaribus, quam Sanctis claustris." — S. Bergitt, Revel., lib. iv. cap. 33, in Appendix to Diar. Vads., p. 226. 8 We have a specimen of his accusations of another class in a letter to the Abbess of Sko convent, where his niece had died : — " Stockholm, 30th October, 1527. " We have heard that our niece has been taken from this world — God be gracious to her soul ! We thank you for the care and trouble you have haS in providing for her and her sister's welfare. But that you seduced a simple and innocent child on her deathbed to ask to assume your Pharisaical habit, that we praise not, well knowing that there is no more sanctity in your habit than in any other, though the members of your and many other orders have employed such-like and different devices for a fish-hook to drag towards them the estates and 166 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. well believe that the inherent defects of the system appeared among them from time to time in the shape of breaches of chastity. On the other hand, it is impossible to hold Gustavus always and altogether blameless, when the aged monks and nuns were driven to beg their bread, and when the younger nuns, often without a paternal home or any other refuge, and with no safeguard from experience, became in great numbers the prey of the seducer, and fell among the most degraded of their sex. Such things must be lamented, however large a share in the causation of their suffering we attribute to the sufferers them- selves. But a more respectful compassion is due to those better members of the religious orders whose keenest sufferings in their destitution were those of the mind — who in the midst of "a relaxed discipline" had kept themselves unspotted, and now looked back with unavailing regret to that life, which they had found a life of safe retirement, quiet study, charitable labour, and earnest, though in some degree mis- directed, devotion. 1 In the better regulated monas- teries there had always been a few of this character. money of those whom they have cajoled." — Biks. Reg., fol. 272 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 130. 1 It may be well to remember here Donne's admonition — " Unsea- sonable prayers, though, because they be rooted in piety, they may be in some sort excusable in him that makes them, yet may be unacceptable to God. St. Augustine prayed for a dead mother, Monica, and St. Ambrose prayed for a dead master, Theodosius ; God forbid we should condemn Augustine or Ambrose of impiety in doing so, but God forbid we should make Augustine or Ambrose's example our rule to do so still !" — Works, vol. i. p. 103, Alford's ed. Chap. VIII. THE MONK NICOLAUS AMUNDI. 167 Among the " idle monks " of the convent of Vadstena there had not only been some of indefatigable in- dustry, and skilled in the higher branches of art, as in glass-painting and architecture, but some of an unfeigned devotion, of great self-denial, zealous and effective preachers, and one so eloquent that his brethren — less strong no doubt in Greek than in their affectionate partiality — regarded him as another Chrysostom. Not the least among the latest worthies of this society seems to have been Nicolaus Amundi, who in the year 1517 records, in terms of great humility, his own election to be confessor-general of the convent, an office to which he was thrice re* elected, for the last time in 1540. 1 The society had previously chosen him as one of their agents to con- duct a difficult negotiation. In 1529, by the King's command, he was sent out with two colleagues to dispute with the Lutherans at the Council of Orebro. He wrote a Discourse between Christ and a Sinner, which is still preserved in the library at Stockholm, and probably continued, or rather assisted in con- tinuing, the Diary of the convent till its close. It was evidently no pleasant task in those days of trial to whomsoever it was committed : to tell, for example, 1 " Eodem anno 1517, concorditer est elecfcus in confessorem gene- ralem fr. Nicolaus Amundi indignissimus hominum quod protestor mami propria. In laborious a juventute meS exaltatus autem hu- miliatus sum et conturbatus." — Diar. Vads., p. 215. He presented a picture of the Virgin to the convent, the record of which event not being mads by himself, he is called therein "pater pius Nicolaus Amundi." 168 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. VIII. that in 1524 the King "extorted" from the convent the shrine of St. Catherine, 1 and in a month after- wards twelve marks of silver from the sacristy ; that in 1529 the commissioners sent to Orebro to confer on the Lutheran doctrines "came back disturbed;" that in 1531 two nuns, "expelled from their own con- vent by the Lutherans," had found shelter at Vad- stena; that in 1540 the King's commissioners pro- hibited in the convent the commemoration of saints and all ceremonies appertaining thereto, nisi pro pace', that on Trinity Sunday in the same year the first Swedish mass was celebrated, and that, when the service was over, the commissioners, proceeding to the sacristy, took an inventory of the chalices, relics, and pixes belonging to the house ; that in 1543 the King came in person, and that by his directions his servants carried off a large number of books, and the stone image of the Virgin, which was near the altar. Hitherto only a single expression here and there had betrayed the feelings of the annalist. But when he has to record that, on the 6th of October in that same year, the Lutheran Bishop of Linkoping, ac- companied by several clergymen, came and put an end to the accustomed service, the invocation of saints, 1 He borrowed this, which weighed 340 lbs. of silver, and was, besides, richly encrusted with gold, upon a promise of faithfully return- ing the value. The promise may have been sincere, but it was not kept. " A Vastenensium Antistita argenteum S. Catharine loculum, ex illo monetam signaturus, obtinet, indubiam spondens et nullam rependens solutionem." — Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 18. Chap. VIII. DIARY OF VADSTEN A CONVENT. 169 prayers and offerings for the dead, the carrying about of lustral water, the use of tapers, salt, and incense in divine worship, the good monk can refrain no longer, and he exclaims, in the bitterness of his sorrow and indignation, " Therefore let his days be few, and his bishopric let another take." His own task was nearly done. In the next year there are but three entries in the Diary. In 1545 one only, the last! It is significant : " The townspeople carried off all the convent wall on the south side." 1 The monks were soon after suppressed ; but the con- vent, spared on account of the beauty of the building, continued during the whole of Gustavus's reign an asylum for the nuns. In 1555, the abbess having com- plained that the provision assigned them by the King had been withholden by his officers because she had not bis written authority, this authority was given on the 8th of April in that year. 2 In 1568 the remain- ing nuns obtained letters of protection from King Eric, and the final dissolution of the convent was deferred until 1595, when Charles the Ninth, after burying his brother, Duke Magnus, at Vadstena, gave the nuns the option of embracing the evangelical religion or leaving, when some married, and some took refuge in a convent in Dantzic. 3 1 Diarium Vadstenese ab anno 1344 ad ann. 1545, vol. i., p. 99, Scrip. Rerum Suec. e Riks. Reg., fol. 54 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 385 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 100. 8 Rhyzelii Monasteriologia Sueogothica, Linkoping, 1740. 1 70 ' GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. CHAPTER IX. Coronation of Gustavus — Continued discontent in the Dales — Exe- cution of the Daleyunker and his council — Eeligious reforms — Contest with the High Steward — Insurrection — Its causes — The Westgpthlamders refuse to join — Act of oblivion — The King's defence of his proceedings — Execution of Brynteson and Olfson. It seemed desirable to exhibit in juxta-position some of the principal features of the decline and fall of the monastic system in Sweden. But, in doing so, the regular course of this narrative has been in- terrupted, and we must now retrace our steps. After the victory at Vesteras, Gustavus thought that the time had arrived to celebrate his coronation, which, though a tax to meet the expenses had been imposed at Vadstena in 1526, had hitherto been delayed. A preliminary council was held at Upsala to make the requisite arrangements, when the King, " before finally binding himself to the government, requested the assembled States to send in their written complaint, if they had anything to urge against him, professing himself much more willing now to resign than that at any future time any disturbance should arise on his account." The Council, while they urged that the coronation ought not to be procras- tinated, availed themselves nevertheless of the King's Chap. IX. HIS CORONATION. 171 gracious permission. The grievance they most com- plained of was the non-maintenance of the religious orders, according to the decrees of Vesteras ; but they complained also that marriages were not cele- brated with suitable masses, as of old, and they prayed that the King would inflict due punishment on those convicted of eating flesh on Good Friday, from which step they augured that "much disturbance would cease, which otherwise might become formidable." 1 The coronation took place at Upsala on the 12 th of February, 1528, when the High Steward, Ture Johnson (Ros), bore the globe, Lars Siggeson (Sparre) the sword, and Holger Carlson (Gere) — who in the following year obtained Stekeborg and its dependencies as a fief — the sceptre : contrary to usual custom no one bore the crown; it stood upon the high altar, Gustavus perhaps thereby meaning to claim it as specially bestowed upon him from Heaven. Lars Siggeson, Berger Nilson, Eric Fleming, John Tureson, Magnus Brynteson, Nils Olfson, Thure' Erickson, Knut Anderson, Magnus Johnson, Bennet Nilson, and Peter Hardy, received the honour of knighthood from the King's hand. Tournaments and other knightly sports graced the ceremony, during which a herald scattered gold and silver pieces among the people. 2 The Dalesmen continued to be discontented and tur- 1 Tegel, 1528. In England, at the beginning of the Reformation, pains and penalties were invoked on those who had " cheese and butter " in their houses on Good Friday.— Burnet, Hist. Reformation, book i. a Tegel, 1528 ; Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 41. 172 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. bulent, and still maintained a correspondence with the impostor, who had fled to Norway. The King, therefore, resolved both to alarm his abettors in the latter country, and to punish those who had supported him in the Dales. He had already obtained, in respect to the Norwegians, the good offices of Denmark, from whence an injunction had been sent to the Archbishop of Drontheim, in 1527, directing him to send back to Sweden the Dale- yunker, as the false Sture was commonly called, and the other malefactors who had found a refuge across the border. He now assembled an army of 14,000 men, and wrote to the Dalesmen on the 14th, and again on the 18th of February, that his intention was to march to the frontier, and learn whether his ene- mies were to find in Norway, not only protection, but encouragement. He meant also to hold an assize at Tuna on Ash Wednesday (26th February), when justice should be done to all who had suffered injury from himself or his lieutenants. If there were any one among them who knew himself guilty, he should yet be free to come to the assize, and return from it without molestation or danger. 1 When the people on the appointed day were as- sembled from the Dale districts in great numbers the King surrounded them with his troops, and pointed his field-pieces against them. The assize then opened with a letter from the rest of the people to the Dalesmen, stating that " they had counselled 1 Eiks. Reg., fol. 306 ; Dip. Dal. 412, 413. Chap. IX. THE ASSIZE AT TUNA. 173 the King to investigate the origin of the late uproar, that its instigators might be punished." Magnus Brynteson followed in a set speech. He dwelt upon the King's clemency in the affair of Knut and Sun- nanvader, and still more recently in the case of the thief impostor whom they had aided and abetted. The Dalesmen interrupted him by thankfully ac- knowledging the King's grace ; they professed, how- ever, at the same time, that they were unconscious of having given any fresh cause of displeasure. "Their rebellious spirit," answered Brynteson, "still continued ; it showed itself in the manner with which they treated the King's officers and spoke of the King himself. If they had their deserts," he affirmed, " not one would reach his home alive." The intercession of the State Council now being earnestly invoked by the Dalesmen, at their request the peasants of those parishes, who had remained loyal to the King, were separated from those, who had taken part in the rebellion. The King then de- manded of the last that the Daleyunker's council and chief supporters should be given up, which being done a short trial took place, and those found guilty were immediately executed. The other offenders then fell upon their knees and implored the King's mercy, — a boon not granted, however, without some apparent hesitation on his side and renewed assur- ances of loyalty on theirs. 1 In the mean time the letters from Denmark and 1 Tegel, 1528 ; Scond. Illust., torn. i. p. 44. 174 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. others from Gustavus himself, threatening the Arch- bishop with severe chastisement, if he continued to harbour and encourage Swedish malefactors, pro- duced their due effect. Some of the criminals were sent back to Sweden, and the false Sture, whom the Archbishop could no longer shield, yet was unwilling to abandon, was put on board a vessel bound to Ros- tock, where he gave himself out for a knight, and Was at first treated with the consideration due to his pretended character ; but Gustavus, having learnt his place of refuge, sent his German secretary to take proceedings against him. He was in conse- quence tried in that city, according to some accounts for his treasons, according to others for the forty marks he had stolen from Knut Anderson, and being , found guilty was beheaded. 1 One of those grievous famines by which Sweden was then frequently visited happened this year. It was of such severity that not only were the people generally compelled to eat bark-bread, but in Ros- lagen and Skariegarden many perished with hunger. Gustavus alleviated in some degree this horrible calamity by importing from Livonia large quantities of meal, which was sold in the different market-towns in succession at a half-mark the spann or half-tunna. 2 While thus providing for the bodily wants of his 1 Tegel, 1528. 8 Ibid. The meal was probably barley-meal, and the price exactly half of that at which the same sort of meal was selling in Dalecarlia in 1549. See Appendix on " Value o"f Money and Commodities in Sweden in the reign of Gustavus." Chap. IX. RELIGIOUS REFORMS. 175 people, Gustavus did not fail to make provision for another class of wants of which they were less sen- sible. At a meeting of the Bishops and principal clergy held at Orebro in 1529, over which Lars Anderson presided, a better provision was made for the preach- ing of the pure word of God throughout the realm. One lesson from the Scriptures, at least, with a good and sound explanation, was ordered to be read daily in the cathedrals and public schools — the lectures in the schools to be so arranged that the choristers might have an opportunity of attending. Learned preachers were to be appointed in the towns, to whom all the rural preachers might resort for instruction. 1 Afternoon lectures to be held in the monasteries. Sermons to be begun and ended with prayer. At every preaching, the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the Ave Maria (which it was not thought prudent yet to set aside) were to be repeated; the Ten Commandments once or twice a month. The Peni- tentiaries were at the same time recommended and empowered to use more sharpness with manslayers and other misdoers. As the frequent holidays gave occasion to many sins, it was ordered that our Lord's own festivals, the Virgin's, the Apostles', and those of the patron saints should be retained, the rest 1 One of the evangelical teachers, when about to expound the Gospel of St. Matthew at Skara, was set upon by the populace, instigated by the Bishop and nobles of Westgothland, and severely handled. — Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 45. 176 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. abolished. A few words were added to correct the superstitious notions current about baptism, Palm- Sunday, Candlemas, Christmas, bell-ringing, &c. Fi- nally, the people were instructed that " the use of pilgrimages is not to offer God a more acceptable service, seeing that He can be served in one place as well as another, but to increase our knowledge." ' The forced consent which the High Steward had been compelled to give to the decrees of Vesteras had probably left behind it no good will towards Gustavus ; but in the next year a personal contest between them, in which the former was worsted, pro- duced the most determined enmity. The King claimed some lands to which the High Steward had succeeded, on the ground that they had been wrong- fully and forcibly obtained from his father by Sten Sture the elder. His claim being allowed, the haughty and powerful nobleman murmured loudly ; and in the spring of 1529 himself and seven other Westgothland lords — of whom Magnus Brynteson especially had enjoyed a considerable share of the King's favour and confidence— together with Magnus Bishop of Skara, joined an insurrection begun by the Smalanders, with the Burgomaster and Town Council of Ibnkoping at their head. The insurgents had already captured the King's sister, the wife of the Count of Hoya — who was returning to Stockholm from Saxony, where she had been to negotiate the King's marriage — and slain the commandant of 1 Tegel, 1529. Chap. IX. INSURRECTION. 177 Nydala convent, with three others of the King's officers. 1 Godfrey Sure, the commandant of Nydala, ob- tained the King's letters investing him with that mo- nastery and its estates on the 4th of March, and as the rebellion broke out within a month of that time, it is probable that indignation at the measure was the immediate cause of the rising. 2 Ture Johnson, how- ever, had, there is little doubt, fostered the feeling of discontent prevalent in the district, and prepared the minds of the younger nobles to revolt with him on the first convenient opportunity. His influence over them was not due to any superiority of under- standing. On the contrary, he seems to have been of that stamp of mind, obstinate, shortsighted, and self-important, which furnishes the tools of a con- spiracy, rather than its leaders. But his great pos- sessions, high rank, and birth, together with his age, caused his treasonable suggestions to be readily lis- tened to, especially as they were enforced by con- siderations which came home to the self-interest of those whom he addressed. In the partition of the lands recovered from the Church Gustavus came in for an enormous share. Connected by blood with the most distinguished 1 Tegel, 1529. Letter from the Burgomaster and Council of Io'n- koping and the Commons of Smaland to Eastgothland, 4th April, 1529. — R. R., fol. 12 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 176. The same to the Bishop of Skara, Ture Johnson, &c, and the Commons of Westgothland, inviting them to rise against Gustavus, 8th April, 1529. — Thys., vol. i. p. 179. 2 Riks. Beg., fol. 7 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 174. N 178 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. families in Sweden* he had a colourable claim to many of the estates which had been alienated since the inquest of Charles Knutson, and it would often happen, that such claims prevailed to the discomfiture of those, who judged that they had the better title. 1- That this was accomplished by underhand means, and that the King, after having made the nobles parties to the spoliation of the Church, meant to share them out, were dangerous suggestions to men who remembered the former power of their order, and now saw that the hope of recovering its inde- pendence was dashed to the ground. But besides this, Magnus Brynteson was tempted to join the con- spiracy by the bait of succeeding to the throne from which Gustavus was to be expelled, and the other young leaders doubtless by the expectation of some of the chief spoils of the victory. 8 When the High Steward wrote to his three sons to join the insurrection, two of them, instead of com- plying, travelled day and night to put into the hands of the King their father's letter Not so the younger son, George, the Dean of Upsala. He obeyed the summons with alacrity, and marching into Norland captured the King's lieutenant. His progress was 1 " Peringskjold (who is a high authority) says that Gustavus ob- tained in virtue of Vesteras ordinantia 20,000 pradia ecclesiastica, church and convent estates, exclusive of money." — Bhyzel. Monast. Sueogothica. 2 "Thuro consensu reliquorum commilitonum Magnum Bruntonis virum corporis elegantia, et sermonis eloqueiitia conspicuum, non magnopere obluctantem, designat regem." — Scond. Illust., torn.- v. p. 46. Chap. IX. LETTER TO IONKOPLNG. 179 soon arrested. He fell into a snare spread for him by a priest of that province, and, being taken prisoner, was carried to Stockholm, where he was detained in an honourable captivity, due partly to the merits of his brothers, and partly perhaps to the King's hope of again reducing his father to a loyal subjection. 1 It required all Gustavus's dexterity to extricate himself from his difficult position. He wrote to the Eastgothlanders, upon the first news of the revolt, to interpose their good offices in order to restore quiet in the neighbouring districts. 2 He wrote smoothly soon after to the town of Ionkoping, affect- ing to treat the detention of his sister as the fruit of their zeal for her safety. " We have heard that, in consequence of a false report current among you, that Stockholm was besieged and that Upland had risen against us, you have detained our sister, the Secre- tary Ulf, and many of her suite, for some time in your city, lest she and they should fall into the hands of such people, for which we graciously thank you ; but since there is no such insurrection as reported in your quarter, we pray you to send her and her at- tendants to us without delay." He affected to think it probable that the commandant of Nydala had pro- voked his fate. He adds in the same letter, — "We have understood also that our lieutenant, Godfrid Sure, has been slain in your province ; pos- 1 Tegel, 1529. 2 Letter dated Stockholm, April 6th, 1529.— E. E., fol. 15 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 185. N 2 180 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. sibly he may have given some provocation thereto by doing injustice there to many, and exceeding our commands : if on that ground any one would engage in insurrection, to the damage of the kingdom and the public, it is very needless. Such affairs have happened before and been settled without injury to the public, and so it may be now, if the ease be pro- perly managed; wherein we look to you to exert yourselves, and put everything upon the best footing, well considering the evil consequences which will otherwise ensue." 1 The Dean and Chapter of Linkbping and several of the market-towns offered their mediation unso- licited. Letters from the Smalanders to the people of Eastgothland, and from Ture Johnson to the Dalesmen, inciting them to rise, were fortunately intercepted ; and Gustavus, notwithstanding his late severity, or perhaps in consequence of his late se- verity, succeeded in obtaining not only the neutrality of the latter, but a letter from them to the rebels warning them not to expect their support, but their decided opposition. 2 At the same time Gustavus sent commissioners into the disturbed districts with authority to promise oblivion for the past outrages, and the removal of the causes which had occasioned them. The effect of these measures was that, when on the 1 Stockholm, 16th April, 1529.— E. E., fol. 23; Thys., vol. i. p. 193. 2 Tegel, 1529. Chap. IX. WESTGOTHLAND BEMAINS LOYAL. 181 Tuesday before St. George's Day (the 23rd of April) the insurgent leaders assembled the Westgothlanders on Larf s Heath, and Ture Johnson urged them to depose Gustavus, as having forsaken the Christian religion and persecuted the Church, and the Bishop of Skara promised that the Pope should release them from their vows of allegiance, they were coldly re- ceived. Two young men answered on behalf of the people, " That a frequent change of kings was costly, and seldom attended with advantage; and that, if they followed the counsels of the Lord Ture and the Bishop, they should have to leave their children a long legacy of the dangers and calamities belonging to civil war. They meant therefore to remain true to Gustavus." The uplifted hands of the assembly having shown their adoption of these views, the chiefs became alarmed for their own safety, and, to avoid an immediate arrest, proposed an adjournment for a fortnight. In the mean time (they said) they would consider as to the best means of propitiating the King. Ture Johnson, however, and the Bishop of Skara did not venture, after the unexpected issue of that day, to remain in the kingdom. Magnus Brynteson (Liliehok), Nils Olfson (Winge), and Thure Erickson (BjelkS), thinking themselves less compromised, refused to share their flight. 1 On the 6th of May Gustavus confirmed the act of grace which his commissioners had concluded with the Smalanders and Westgothlanders on the 25th of 1 Tegel, 1529. 182 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. the preceding month, wherein it was promised that there should be a complete oblivion of all that had been said or done in the late rebellion, by temporal or spiritual, gentle or simple ; that the violence put Upon Margaret Vasa should be avenged neither by the Count nor by their children born or unborn, but should be clean forgotten, as if it had been never offered; that all good Christian customs should be preserved ; and that no heresy should be tolerated in the land, upon condition that all, of every degree in the provinces aforesaid, should give their promise, under hand and seal, to be true to the King, and to clear his reputation with the common people, which in many points they had blackened. 1 He wrote on the 9th of the same month to Ture Johnson, ac- quainting him with the contents of the act of grace, and inviting him to return to Sweden and avail him- self of it; and on the same day to the people of Westgothland and Wermeland, promising, with more particularity than in the act itself, to discountenance all heretical preaching, to maintain all good old Christian customs, and to preserve as many monas- teries as the people themselves might think advan- tageous. 2 It need not be said that the promiser gave these assurances in a sense different from that in which the promisees would receive them. 1 Treaty with the rebellious Westgothlanders and Smalanders, Stockholm, 6th May, 1529.— E. E., fol. 40 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 202. B E. E„ fol. 45 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 211. Chap. IX. THE EEVOLT SUPPRESSED. 183 As soon as the High Steward had left the country, Magnus Brynteson and Thure Erickson made a great show of loyalty, seized his chateau in the name of the King, and wrote to Gustavus acquainting him with what they had done in that matter, and declaring that, after the meeting on Larf s Heath, when Ture John- son's treasonable designs had become apparent,, they had at once deserted his party. They demanded, therefore, an investigation into their conduct, profess- ing their unwillingness to accept a pardon, as if they had been guilty, or to renew the oath of allegiance which they had never broken. ' The idea that no con- clusive proof of their participation, in the conspiracy could be established against them was the cause of their rash and fatal confidence. It was grounded upon this:— A priest named Nils of Hvalstad, sta- tioned at Tiveden with a division of the rebels, had kept up a correspondence with all the chiefs of the conspiracy. These letters had fallen into the hands of Gustavus through the address and courage of a spy, who had suffered himself to be captured, and during his captivity had contrived to possess himself of them and escape to Stockholm. The priest, when questioned on the subject of the correspondence by those whom it compromised, fearing to confess the truth, said that he had burnt it to prevent discovery. Deceived by this falsehood, Magnus Brynteson and Thure Erickson wrote to the King as above stated. 1 Gustavus answered them coldly, referred them to 1 Tegel, 1529. 184 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. his act of grace, regretted that they had taken pos- session of Ture Johnson's chateau, as this might appear a violation of its promises, and granted their request for a judicial investigation of their conduct, by appointing a State meeting at Strengness for the purpose on St. Botolph's day. 1 "When the estates were assembled, the King, who was present, prefaced the business of the day, first, by complaining of Ture Johnson's ingratitude ; and secondly, by repelling the charges which had been urged against him as pretexts for the late rebellion. To the charge of fostering heresy he answered that it was not he, but the Lord, who had commanded the preaching of the pure gospel. As to other points of opinion, he was quite willing that learned men should meet together and adjust them. To the accusation of having broken the oath by which he bound him- self to preserve the privileges of the Church, he replied that he had done nothing but what had been ratified at Vesteras, and that in lessening the power of the Bishops he had only deprived them of what they had abused to the disturbance and injury of the kingdom : the seizing upon the convents also had been with the consent of the States, and had been to the advantage, not of himself alone, but of the whole realm. Many monks had left their convents, it was true, but none had been expelled except some foreign monks, who remained in the country rather to encou- 1 Letter dated Upsala, May, 1529 (despatched either on the 21st or 22nd).— E. E., fol. 50 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 225. Chap. IX. DEFENCE OF HIS PROCEEDINGS. 185 rage rebellion than for any other purpose. If he or his officers had expelled, in any other instances, monk or nun, he would answer for it ; but he hoped no such case could be established. 1 He confessed that, as so many of the convents had become empty, he had seized upon their plate and valuables ; but this was partly to pay the debt of the state, and partly to maintain students in theology, that there might be a supply of persons qualified to teach throughout the kingdom. On the subject of mass in Swedish, he had neither commanded nor forbidden it ; but allowed the clergy in. that respect to follow their conscience and God's word. The same thing had taken place in other kingdoms. Moreover, the Latin mass was not discontinued, but used together with the Swedish, so that there was no great ground for complaint. As the decrees of Vesteras had been one of the chief causes of the rebellion, the King explained more fully the reasons which had induced the States to adopt them. They had found that the worldly en- gagements of the Bishops interfered with their duty as preachers of God's word ; their power and their strongholds with the King's rights and the adminis- tration of justice, and were besides inconsistent with our Saviour's command that his ministers should not be temporal princes. They had found that the estates and tenants of the convents were neglected, that the monks had diminished in each from forty or fifty to five or six, and that they were leading luxu- 1 Vide supra, p. 163. 186 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. IX. rious lives owing to their over ample provision. They had considered, moreover, that God could not be properly worshipped with so much reading and singing as had been usual up to that time, but was worshipped best by the preaching of the gospel ; that monasteries and cathedrals, with their staff, were therefore not necessary to the perfection of Divine worship, seeing that this had been better maintained before their establishment than after. Moreover, it appeared from the old registers, and from the number of estates now in the hands of peasants, that, where there were formerly a hundred nobles, there were now only three or four. Of their estates the nobles had been deprived, partly in their simplicity, think' ing to do God service ; partly by sale or mortgage, when hard pressed for money ; — now, as the nobles could not by reason of these alienations do military service to the Crown (and the rather that horses and armour had doubled in price), the States had thought it right that they should get a portion of their lands back again. — for their ancestors had no right to strip their descendants of their possessions. 1 After this exposition, the Council, having first ac- quitted Gustavus of the charges brought against him, proceeded to the trial of the rebel lords, Brynteson, Olfson, and Erickson. As they stoutly maintained their innocence, though cautioned by the Council, Gustavus asked them " what they were prepared for, if the contrary could 1 Tegel, 1529. Chap. IX. CONDEMNATION OF REBEL LEADERS. 187 be proved against them?" They answered, "Our heads upon the block, our bodies on the wheel, as the law demands." The King, unwilling that they should die, or desirous that their blood should evi- dently be upon their own heads, asked them again if they would stand their trial, or confess their guilt and accept his pardon. But, confident, as they said, that no guilt could be established against them, they chose to stand their trial, when their own letters were produced, fully implicating them in the conspi- racy, and they were condemned to death. 1 A pear-tree grew near the house in an upper chamber of which Magnus Brynteson was confined after his condemnation, and suggested hopes of escape. It might be possible, he thought, to spring from his window, and, catching hold of some of the extreme branches, to lower himself gradually to the ground. He made the attempt ; but having missed his aim, fell, and lay with a crushed leg, until discovered by the sentry in the morning. He was then conveyed to Stockholm, and, together with Nils Olfson, exe- cuted there, some few weeks after his removal. The life of the remaining culprit was spared, upon the petition of his mother, but not without a large sum being paid for his redemption. 2 1 Tegel, 1529. At the same meeting on Midsummer-day some con- cessions were made to the wishes of the people. Among the rest — a few monks were to remain, and a tariff was settled for the sums to be paid for troop-horses quartered upon the peasantry. The estates of Ture Johnson and the Bishop of Skara were confiscated at the same meeting. * Ibid. 188 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. CHAPTER X. Arrangements for discharging the debt to Lubeck — General dis- satisfaction — Eiots in the Dales — Unsuccessful attempt of Christian on Sweden — Murder of the High Steward — Treaty between Frederic and Christian — Violated by Frederic — Chris- tian's imprisonment, death, and character. In 1529 the Count "of Hoya and Ulf Gyler were sent to Lubeck to arrange for the payment of the debt. Notwithstanding the continual appropriations made professedly for the purpose of paying it off, the principal of the debt still remained at its original amount of 61,681 Lubeck marks for ships and war munitions, and 8689 marks for money advanced. It was now settled, however, that the whole should be paid off in six years. In consideration of this arrangement the privileges of trade in Sweden, for- merly conceded to the Hanse towns generally, were — by an article to be kept secret from the excluded towns — thenceforth confined to Lubeck. 1 It needed a threat on the part of that city, to detain the Swedish ships, and to withhold the usual supplies of salt, hops, &c, if its demands were not satisfied, before the States could be induced to pro- vide for carrying out the arrangement of the King's commissioners. Meetings took place at Upsala in 1 Tegel, 1529. Chap. X. GENERAL DISCONTENT. 189 1530, and at Orebro in the beginning of 1531, when at last it was reluctantly agreed that to meet the stipulated payments — in addition to a sequestration of rent and tithes for a given time — the superfluous bells of both the town and country parishes should be given up or redeemed. 1 These decrees gave in the provinces generally, but especially in the Dales, the most intense dissatisfac- tion. The people inquired with an indignant curio- sity, "what had become of, the repeated contributions made to pay the debt, what of the wealth of the Church reserved for the same object, since the Lubeckers had not been paid from that fund ? " 2 Had they been better satisfied that what was required of them was indeed necessary, it would not have been pleasant to ^those who had lived where "bells had knolled to church " — even as a matter of ear and sen- timent — to have " the largest bell," or " the bell next to the largest," taken, and their melody turned into a jangle. But a deeper feeling mingled with the sacri- fice which was demanded. Their bells were in the eyes of good Roman Catholics sacred, not only from their religious uses, but also from the ceremonies by 1 Tegel, 1530, 1531. 2 At Upsala, on the 20th May, 1530, the largest bell in the cities of the kingdom was appropriated. "Plebeculam vero propterea tu- multuantem, et magnopere admirantem quo devenirent tot facte hactemis contributiones totque divitiarum ex regni ecclesiis contri- butiones, quando quidem," &c. At Orebro, on the 6th January, 1531, the King obtained permission to seize upon the bell next to the largest in every rural parish, ab Ordinibus difficulter assentientibus. — Scond. Illust., torn, v, pp. 52, 53, 190 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. which they had been set apart for those uses. 1 It was therefore with no small indignation that some of the Dalesmen sought counsel of Magnus Nilson, and other chief men in that district, asking whether they should be content that their sacred bells, which had been christened, anointed, and conse- crated, should be thus taken from them? Magnus Nilson himself was not in a mood to throw oil on the troubled waters. From that day (he said) he would never again support Gustavus, but oppose him to the utmost of his power. The King had set at nought their privileges, come among them as often, and with what numbers, he chose. He had even crossed Brunbeck's ford— no leave asked of the miners and the Dalesmen— a thing upon which no former King or Regent had ventured. He advised them, there- fore, when the King's officers came to demand their bells, to spare their lives indeed, but to give them a good beating. This advice the Dalesmen followed, and in one instance, that of Lasse Erickson, with such a critical nicety that the life of the maltreated officer was for some time despaired of. 2 Magnus Nilson having declined to be general of the rebels, Nils of Soderby was chosen instead, and, 1 The author was once staying at a village in Switzerland when a baptism of bells took place. The godmothers, who were the richest damsels of the parish, provided their godchildren with dresses suitable for the ceremony, and gave them their own names. 2 Tegel, 1531 ; Gustavus to the Dalesmen, Stockholm, 19th March, 1531.; B. R., fol. 209 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 361. Chap. X. RIOTS IN THE DALES. 191 taking 150 men with him, plundered the King's estates at Hedemora. Gustavus, when he heard how matters stood, said, " it was now the Dalesmen's time to riot, but, as soon as his time came, he would see what God would allow him to do." l Symptoms that this time was not probably far dis- tant quickly appeared. A meeting, called by the rebels to consult on matters concerning the general welfare, failed ; while at another meeting of the King's appointment, held at Upsala, he overawed some murmurers, and the assembled Council resolved that no part of the kingdom should be excused from furnishing their bells according to the decree of Orebro. 2 After this, without coming to any regular treaty with the rebels — into which they would fain have entered, being weary of. neglecting their agriculture and going constantly armed — Gustavus appeared to have taken an indulgent view of the late outbreak, and, affecting to be dissatisfied with Lasse Erickson, he reappointed one of their own countrymen, who was popular in the Dales, Ingel Hanson, as his lieutenant in that district. 3 1 Tegel, 1531. 2 Jbid. 3 Letter to Ingel Hanson, 25th March, 1531.— R. R., fol. 211 ; Dip. Dal. (464.) On the 31st of the same month the King wrote to Magnus Nilson — " You ought not to indulge the idea which perhaps you entertain, that we harbour any displeasure against you ; for any such impression which we might have towards you in this affair is completely obliterated by the fidelity which you have shown us and the realm in former disturbances, and which we trust you will even yet show us in the present." — R. R., fol. 213 ; Thys., vol. i. p. 370. 192 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. The reason of this apparent clemency was an im- pending expedition of Christian, to which he had been urged by Gustavus Trolle and Ture Johnson. After the High Steward had left' the kingdom Gustavus wrote in the most friendly terms, offering him pardon for the past and the full enjoyment of his possessions, if he chose to accept the terms published in his act of grace to the Westgothlanders and Smalanders. Johnson answered in a joint letter with the Bishop of Skara, thanking the King for his gra- cious offer, which both would have gladly accepted, had it not contained a determination to abide by the decrees of Vesteras Recess. These, the real causes of the late disturbances, they could not conscien- tiously sanction. They concluded by requesting that the possessions of both in Sweden, and the wife and children of the High Steward, might be restored. It was now evident that the breach was not healable, and when, somewhat later in the year, Ture Johnson urgently pressed Gustavus to send over his wife, he received the following short answer : — " We greet you as you have deserved. Whereas you write concerning your wife Ingeborg, quoting the words of the Holy Evangelist, ' Quos Deus conjunxit,' &c, you had better reflect upon that other sentence that is written, Quos Sathan conjunxit homo separat. Valete." 1 ' The joint letter was dated " Halmstad, 30th May, 1529."— R. R., fol. 64; Thys., vol. i. p. 241. The King's laconic note in September. — Thys., vol. i. p. 243. Chap. X. CHRISTIAN'S ATTEMPT ON SWEDEN. 193 Christian lent a ready ear to the flattering promises of the High Steward, and, accompanied by him, set sail from Holland on the 26th of October, 1531, with a fleet of twenty-five ships bound for Opslo (Chris- tiana) in Norway. He had once adopted the re- formed religion, but it was in the character of a champion of the Catholic faith and an extirpator of heresy that he now appeared. Though a storm had dispersed his squadron, and only eleven ships could be mustered when he arrived at Opslo, the Norwegian bishops and nobles willingly renewed to Christian their oath of allegiance, and the exiled Swedish lords endeavoured, by representing him as a thoroughly changed man, to enlist the Dalesmen in his favour. But in vain ; 2 the Bloodbath was still remembered, and all the detestable cruelties and treacheries with which it was accompanied, and when, in the spring of 1532, Christian, moving into Bohusland, instead of the cordial reception which he had been taught to expect from the Swedes, saw 3000 Swedish troops — who had marched from Lodose, now Gottenburg — coming out to attack him, he turned to Ture Johnson and said, " You told me that I should not find a man in Sweden to oppose me. Are those women then? Such representations may be to my loss, but they will not be to your advantage." 2 These words of evil omen were soon verified. The 1 Bergsmen and Dalesmen's answer to Gustavtis Trolle", April or May, 1532.— Dip. Dal. 487. s Tegel, 1532 ; Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 57. O 194 ,' GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. next morning the headless truiik of the High Steward was found in the streets of Kongelf. After some partial success, in which Christian established a claim to a godd deal of military talent, he was compelled to retreat for want of provisions, the supply of which the ertemy effectually prevented, and, when he arrived again at Opslo, he had of all his force scarcely 2000 men remaining, the rest having been destroyed in going out to forage, or by famine. Frederic, equally interested with Gustavus in the event of this war, strongly urged by him to take ad- vantage of the crisis, and propitiated by the recovery of Bohusland, which was restored to Denmark after ten years' occupation, sent out a naval force to relieve Aggerhusj then besieged by the fleet of the ex-King. This was effectually accomplished '; and the combined fleets of Denmark and the Hanse towns having soon after sailed into Opslo frith and burnt all the ships which were before the toWn, Christian's army, with- out pay and without hope of pay (for the war-chest was empty, and the Norwegian churches exhausted), compelled him to treat for a surrender. 1 Negotiations were accordingly opened with Knut Gyldenstjern (Bishop-elect of Odensee), the com- mander of the expedition, which were protracted from the 12th of May to the 1st of July. While they were still pending Frederic wrote to Gyl- 1 Tegel, 1532; Hvitfeldt, 1532. From these partly, but chiefly from Behrman's account of the captivity and release of Christian the Second (Copenhagen, 1812), I have taken what follows. Chap. X. TREATY WITH CHRISTIAN. 195 denstjern not to agree to Christian's demand of re- taining Norway or a part thereof, but to drive him from the country, which he could be compelled at all events soon to leave. The Bishop did not under- stand this letter as absolutely forbidding all nego- tiation with Christian, and a verbal message from Frederic, allowing only an unconditional surrender, he denied having received. It was therefore under the powers with which he was originally intrusted, that he signed a treaty with Christian, dated the 1st July, 1532, stipulating that the latter, on the one hand, should discontinue hostilities, and, on the other, embark himself and 200 attendants on board the Danish fleet under a safe-conduct to sail with it to Denmark, and there endeavour, at a personal inter- view with his uncle, to adjust their differences. Should this attempt fail he was to be set at liberty either in Germany or in Norway. After the instruments had been executed with all due solemnity, Christian wrote to his uncle that he was coming back to him " as the prodigal son;" but his return was not welcomed with similar rejoicings : on the contrary, his arrival in Copenhagen roads 1 threw the King and Council into the greatest embar- rassment. What was to be done ? To set him at liberty was against all policy — to detain him was against all justice. To set him at liberty would be at once to let loose an enemy to the peace and quiet of Denmark, and to incur the displeasure of Gustavus 1 On the eve of St. James's Day (i. e. 24th July). Tegel, 1532. o 2 196 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. and the Hanse Towns, who were in their different measures interested in, and anxious for, his detention. All the ingenuity therefore which could be mustered to get rid of the inconvenient treaty was brought into play. Some thought indeed that faith ought to be kept, but the more palatable suggestions — that, since the treaty had not been sealed with the King's seal, and had been signed after the full powers conferred upon Gyldenstjern had been reyoked, it was not bind- ing — preponderated. If any doubt still remained, Gyldenstjern dispersed it by stating that Christian could not expect the conditions of the treaty to be observed in his favour, since he had violated it him- self, by sending to the Emperor the act wherein the Norwegian bishops and magnates acknowledged him as King, and his son as his rightful heir and suc- cessor. With such pretexts were the pleas of justice stifled, and it was determined to send the prisoner to the castle of Sonderborg in Holstein. After he had been five days at Copenhagen, four of the State-Council came on board his ship and informed him that the King was at Flensborg, and that they had orders to accompany him thither. The fleet got under weigh, but when, instead of sailing, up Flensborg Firth, he perceived that his vessel was steered for Sonderborg, the last gleam of hope vanished, and the miserable man bewailed with bitter tears the snare into which he had fallen. At first he was imprisoned in the blue tower of that fortress, with a little dwarf, Chap. X. FREDERIC VIOLATES THE TREATY. 197 whom he had captured in Norway, and four young noblemen for his attendants ; but, upon some attempt to communicate with his relations in Germany, he was removed to a dungeon on the eastern tower, where one small 'window served rather to show the gloom than to give light, where provisions and fuel were conveyed to him through a hole in the wall, and where the dwarf was now his only companion. To the darkness of this gloomy prison the eyes of the wretched prince became at length so accustomed, that he would sometimes while away the time by drawing on the walls ; and, by marks on a marble table which stood in the middle of the apartment, he kept a register of the circuits round it, which made up his daily exercise. 1 Dreadful as such a captivity must have been even to one who could support it with a good man's hope and a martyr's constancy, what must it have been to such a man as Christian, with a conscience so stained with perjury, treachery, and blood ? Yet for twelve years it continued with unmitigated rigour : the only change was in the companion of his captivity. After some time the poor dwarf feigned sickness, and was liberated. His place was supplied by an old soldier, to whom Christian became much attached, and whose loss added one more bitter ingredient to the full cup of his misery. In 1544 his imprisonment was, by a treaty with the Emperor, so far relaxed that he was 1 A drawing of Copenhagen castle' was found upon the walls of his dungeon. 198 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. X. permitted to go into the town, and now and then to shoot, and in 1549 he was removed to Callundborg castle, where eight noblemen and eighty other at- tendants composed at once his household and his guard. An attempt to elude these deprived him of the privilege of shooting, which he had before en^ joyed ; in other respects the indulgences granted him remained unaltered. Christian the Third treated him kindly, sent him money to dispense among the poor, and condescended to excuse himself for not providing him with foreign ale, which was then a favourite beverage. When Christian learnt the death of his benefactor, who died on New Year's Day, 1559, he was deeply affected. The new King sent from Kolding on the 15th January an order that he should not leave the castle; but the order had scarcely reached its destination before the prisoner was released by death from his long, unjust, and yet richly-merited captivity. He died on the 24th of January, in the 78th year of his age ; his body was conveyed to Odensee and buried in the church of the Franciscans by the side of his father. The abilities of this prince have been extolled, perhaps with reason, but in the storm of his tumul- tuous passions they had little opportunity for steady exercise, and, with such a temperament as his, were powerful chiefly for mischief. He has been described as one whose vast conceptions were in advance of his age. 1 It would have been more reasonable to repre- 1 Behrman, preface. Chap. X. CHARACTER OP CHRISTIAN. 199 sent him as one whose plans were ever bounded by shifting and short-sighted views of his own interest. It is not easy to believe that the zeal for the com- mons, pretended by the author of the Bloodbath, proceeded from an enlightened humanity and hatred of oppression, nor that his patriotism was more genuine than his religion, which was Catholic or Protestant just as it served his turn. To exalt such a monster into a sort of humanito-political martyr is a treason to the great names who, to benefit their fellow-creatures, have become the victims of bigotry and ignorance. 1 Let it be conceded that he was not altogether detestable •, let it be admitted that, as there is, they say, heat in the coldest bodies, so there were in him some sparks of remorse and tenderness to vindicate his claim to our common nature ; yet the most compassionate must acknowledge the right- eousness of the fate which provokes their pity, and see in that fate the hand of an Almighty God turn- ing even the injustice of man into the instrument .of his just retribution. 2 1 One Cyprseus pictured Christian as a saint in his ' History of the Church of Slesvick.' — Holberg, vol. ii. p. 16.2. s He was subject, during his captivity, to hereditary fits of depres- sion, and these towards the end of his life, from the intemperate use of Italian wine, amounted to melancholy madness. — Ibid., vol. ii. p. 378. 200 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. CHAPTER XI. Marriage of Gustavus — His determination to humble the Dalesmen — Execution of their leaders — War between Lubeok and Holland — Claims of Lubeok — Their validity denied by Gustavus — Birth of an heir — The Lubeckers revive the claims of Christian and make war on Denmark — Gustavus supports the Danes — Siege of Copenhagen — Triumph of the allies, and acknowledgment of Christian the Third — Eesults of the war — Conspiracy to assassi- nate Gustavus — Condemnation of Olaus Petri and Lars Anderson for not revealing the plot. The marriage of Gustavus with the Princess Cathe- rines of Saxony having been determined on, that the ceremony might be performed by the highest dig- nitary of the Swedish Church, the prelates and most distinguished of the clergy assembled in Stockholm at Midsummer, 1531, to elect an Archbishop. There were four candidates, of whom the most celebrated were Laurentius Petri and Lars Anderson. The former, who was elected by a great plurality of votes, officiated at the marriage, which took place the Sun- day before Michaelmas. The bride received for her dower the castle, town, and adjacent territory of Calmar, the castle of Bornholm, and Oland. 1 It was a natural and graceful act on the part of the young Queen to plead for those who had incurred the King's displeasure, and she interposed her good 1 Tegel, 1531. Chap. XI. LETTER TO THE DALESMEN. 201 offices for the rebellious Dalesmen, who shortly be- fore the marriage had entreated pardon, and offered 2000 marks (ortugher) for the redemption of their bells. The King listened to their prayer, accepted the proffered composition, and gave the delinquents an assurance of forgiveness. He was, however, not the less determined, as soon as the danger from with- out should be removed, to strike a blow at the pre- tensions which they constantly put forth, and which were at once inconsistent with the authority of the monarch and the peace of the kingdom. The blow was aimed immediately at those who, in the affair of the bells, had been the foremost to embody those pretensions, and to carry them out into actual rebel- lion. On the 19th January, 1533, the King wrote to the principal parishes in the Dales that he had consulted with the State Council, now that (God be praised !) outward peace was restored, as to the best means of preserving the inward peace of the king- dom, and that they had advised him to separate from the Dalesmen those who were wont to excite them to disturbance ; that he was accordingly coming up to the Coppermine with a large force — for which he re- quired them to provide rations — to hold an inquest. He added that this step would be unnecessary if they would assist his lieutenants and apprehend Magnus Mlson and some others within eight days. 1 It would appear that the capture did not take place within the limited period, for we find Gustavus 1 Letter dated from Vester&s.— II. R., fol. 89 ; Dip. Dal. 494. 202 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. writing again on the 30th of the same month, ap- pointing the following Sunday for the proposed meet- ing, and requesting that twelve prudent men might be chosen from each parish to confer with him afc the place appointed. 1 On the same day, to humiliate them the more effectually, he wrote to the minister and churchwardens of Tuna, which was one of the richest parishes in the Dales, requesting them to ransack the church and to bring to him, together with the registers and papers thereto belonging, all the plate and jewels they could lay their hands upon, to supply the deficiency of the bell-tax. 2 It required some compulsion to bring the people together on the appointed day, but when they were assembled Gus- tavus told them that they had played with him too often, and that he, meant this to be the finish- ing game. Their district must either be an obe- dient district or a desert. He would teach them to set bounds to their lawful King, or to forbid him to travel where he pleased throughout his dominions ! The leaders, who had been previously taken, were now brought forward, when Nils of Soderby and one or two more were executed on, the spot. Magnus Nilson, Anders Pehrson, Ingel Hanson, and some others were sent to Stockholm, where they were tried on the 17th February in the following year for the riot in the affair of the bells, and for mimquently ' Wasby.— B. E., fol. 101 ; Dip. Dal. 496. 2 Hedemora, — Dip. Dal. 497. Chap. XT. EXECUTION OP EEBELS. 203 carrying on a treasonable correspondence with the partisans of Christian, found guilty, and executed. 1 These severe measures produced the desired effect. The Dalesmen learnt at length that they had to deal with a King who would not divide with them his prerogative, who, by his prudence, defeated all their schemes, and whose slow but sure vengeance punished every outrage against his authority. There were no more rebellions in the Dales during the reign of Gus- tavus. While the King was engaged in accomplishing this object he was threatened with hostilities from another quarter. The Lubeckers, who had for some time been viewing with jealousy the increasing trade of Holland, asked and obtained leave from Frederic — angry with the Hollanders for having brought Chris- tian to Norway — permission to pass the Sound and attack them. Expeditions were accordingly sent out in 1532 and 1533 under the command of Marcus Meyer, a Lu- becker, who had formerly been a smith, but whose courage and ambition prompted him "to exchange the hammer for the commander's staff." On the last of these expeditions he was driven on the English coast and captured. The mediation of the Hanse Towns, however, procured his release, and, on his departure from England, Henry the Eighth knighted 1 Tegel, 1533. "Magnus Nilson was so rich that, according to tradition, his horses were shod with silver " (Geijer) ; perhaps as the streets of London are paved with gold. 204 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. him and loaded him with presents. His marriage with the- widow of a former burgomaster increased his credit in his native town, where, in concert with another able and voluble demagogue, George Wol- lenwever, he succeeded in reviving the ancient con- stitution of the Council, which provided that a third part should go out every year, and thus opened a way for introducing into the government his own partisans, and of finally establishing there, for himself and his colleague, a preponderating authority. 1 In 1533 the newly-constituted Council endeavoured to draw Gustavus into a convention to exclude all foreign vessels, except those of the Hanse Towns, from the trade of the Baltic. But the King was not disposed to throw away so soon his partially recovered freedom. He replied that the navigation of the seas ought to be open, and that any attempt on his part to interrupt it would embroil hiin with Holland and other states. 3 The Lubeckers, under the influence of their new guides, resented this answer by impounding some property of Gustavus lying in their city to the amount of 7000 marks, on the ground that from 8000 to 10,000 marks of the debt still remained un- 1 Hvitfeldt, 1533. They recommended this scheme to the burghers by representing to them that the Reformation would make no progress while the old Council remained in power, and by the appointment of a Vigilance Committee of 164 burghers to watch the proceedings of the burgomasters, and Council. This example was followed in Rostock, Wismar, and other pla»es (says. Hvitfeldt), to their great detriment. * Hvitfeldt, 1533. Chap. XI. QUARREL WITH LUBECK. 205 liquidated. They said at the same time that " they had given the King his throne, and that they would take it away again, since he had proved so un- grateful." Gustavus retaliated by imprisoning the Lubeck traders who happened to be in Sweden, by confiscat- ing the wares belonging to that state, and by depriv- ing it of the privileges reserved by the late treaty. To their complaints of ingratitude and pretended claim he said that they had been paid twice over for all they had lent or done on his behalf. 1 In truth Gustavus and the Lubeekers not only could not agree as to the degree of influence which their services had had upon his fortunes, but not even as to their pecu- niary amount. Gustavus contended that the sum claimed by them was greater than the figures in their own state-register. Moreover, he wanted to deduct the cost of four ships supplied by Lubeck, which were lost, as he alleged, from having been despatched to Sweden too late in the year. The Count of Hoya, •who in 1529 had admitted the Lubeekers' computa- tion, and agreed that if the debt were not paid off within the stipulated time he would become himself a hostage for its payment, had thereby incurred the King's displeasure. The estrangement thus begun, being followed by a family quarrel, ended in a perfect rupture, and when, in spite of repeated summonses to Stockholm, he proceeded in 1534 to Lubeck, it was ' Tegel, 1533. 206 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. not as a hostage, but to take arms against his brother- in-law and sovereign. 1 On the 13th of December of the preceding year, while these clouds were gathering, the Queen gave birth to her eldest son, Eric, destined to cause Gus- tavus so much anxiety, and by his tragical death to cast so deep a stain upon the house of Vasa. The Queen was three days in labour, and on the third day, when the courtiers were no doubt prepared for evil auguries, the King's physician, who was an astrologer, said, "Pray that the child may not be born in this hour, for, if it be, it will be to you and all the kingdom a child of sorrow." He had scarcely spoken these words when the cry of the new-born babe was heard in the Queen's chamber. 2 The King, if he was informed of these prognosti- cations, gave no heed to them. He rejoiced in the birth of his first-born, and redoubled his diligence to secure to him the throne which he had so hardly won, and hitherto so well defended. The Lubeckers, un- able to find a pretender to that throne in Swante Sture, took advantage of the death of Frederic the Third, 3 and the state of parties in Denmark, to re- vive the claims of the captive King to the three 1 Tegel, 1534. Messenius says that the Count was angry with the King ; " quod minus aeque haereditaria prsedia divisisset cum sorore Margareta, Comitis uxore." — Tom. v. p. 63. The German secretary, Ulf Gyler, who had long been in traitorous correspondence with him and the Lubeckers, joined him at Lubeck. 8 Tegel, 1533. 8 Frederic died in April, 1533. Chap. XI. THE COUNT'S WAR. 207 northern kingdoms. The prize to be first contended for, however, was the throne of Denmark, to which Prince Christian, the eldest son of the late King, appeared to have the strongest title : but his preten- sions, though supported by the nobles, were not seconded by the bishops and clergy on account of his inclination for the reformed doctrines, and they pleaded that his second brother John, who was still a child, and who, they thought, might be brought up in the Roman Catholic religion, had a better right to the throne than his elder brother, inasmuch as he only of the two had been born after his father had attained the sovereignty. The burgesses and the peasants again were inclined to the cause of the de- posed King, who had always aftected a peculiar zeal for their interests. 1 The Lubeckers, that they might be free to carry on their operations against Denmark and Sweden, on the 5th of March, 1534, concluded a truce of four years with Holland. Count Christopher of Olden- burg, a canon of Cologne — from whom this war was called the Count's war — was induced to become their general. The town of Copenhagen surrendered to him, as the representative of Christian, in July, 1534. The castle of Malmo had at Whitsuntide been seized upon by the burghers of that city, with Greorge Mynter at their head, in the name of the ex-King. These successes procured the acknowledgment of his claims both in Zealand and Scania. On the other 1 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 62. 208 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. hand, Prince Christian was elected King by the nobles of Jutland and Funen. A meeting to accom- modate differences between this prince and Count Christopher had no good result, as the latter pro- posed that the Prince should be content with Holstein — to which duchy the Lubeckers had acknowledged his claim — and surrender to his cousin Zealand, Funen, Scania, and Norway. 1 Gustavus was no inattentive observer of these movements. An expedition, indeed, despatched by him to relieve Copenhagen — having found that city and all Zealand in the hands of Christopher — re- turned; but he did not relax his efforts. He sup- plied the Duke of Holstein with money, and sent John Ture'son (Eos) with a force of 5000 men across the border, to support his cause in Holland and Scania. Ture'son, having taken Halmstadt, was soon after joined by 500 well-armed cavaliers of the Scanian nobility, and the united forces encountered a division of Christopher's army, under the Count of Hoya, at Helsingborg, on the 13th January, 1535. The citadel, which commanded the town, was held by Tycho Krabbe. His dispositions were not exactly known ; but they were supposed not unfavourable to the Prince, as he had refused to give up the fortress to Christopher. Reckoning, therefore, upon his sup- 1 Hvitfeldt, 1534. It appears that, though Meyer and Wollenwever openly supported the ex-King's pretensions, there was a secret compact with some of the leading burghers of Copenhagen and Malmo to include those cities in the Hanseatic league.— Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 62. Chap. XI. SUPPORTS THE DANES. 209 port or neutrality, the allies attacked the Count with boldness in the streets of the town and gained some advantage. The cannon from the citadel then turned against the Lubeckers, and completed the victory. Numbers were slain or driven into the sea. The Count himself and the German Secretary, Ulf Gyler, escaped, but the Burgomaster, Marcus Meyer, who with 1500 men had thrown himself into a convent, was taken prisoner, and — after some dispute between the allies as to the possession of his person — finally sent to Warberg, where he was courteously received by the Commandant and placed upon his parole. This did not prevent him from concerting with the burghers of the town to gain possession of the fortress. When all was ripe for execution, at an appointed hour in the evening, Meyer drew up to the window of his room a rope-ladder, which had been attached to a piece of string let down for the purpose. Eighty of the German garrison were thus enabled to enter the apartment, where they lay concealed for the night. In the morning, as soon as the Commandant had gone down to the port, they rushed out, headed by Meyer, slew all they met, barred the gates, and re- mained masters of the citadel. The Commandant on his return, finding what had happened, retreated to Lund. 1 The Duke of Holstein, however, continued to gain ground upon his opponents. In June, 1535, his generals gained a decisive 1 Tegel, 1534 ; Hvitfeldt, 1534. P 210 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. victory over the Lubeckers at Orneberg, near As- sens, in Funen. Having ascertained where the enemy was posted, they marched to the spot by night, leaving their camp fires still burning, and falling upon him by surprise, after a hard struggle, put him to the rout. Archbishop Trolle fell in this battle mortally wounded. The Count of Hoya was taken prisoner, but, as he was dismounting from his horse to com- plete his surrender, a Holstein nobleman, with whom he had a feud, came up and stabbed him to the heart. 1 A naval victory in the same year made the cause of the ex-King still more desperate. The united Swedish, Danish, and Prussian fleets, consisting of thirty-two sail,' encountered twenty-six Lubeck ships at Bornholm, and took ten of them. In the following year Malmo and Warberg surrendered ; the last after an obstinate defence. Meyer was taken at Warberg, and put to death. A decree of the Imperial Chamber deprived George Wollenwever of the burgomastership in Lubeck. He fell at last into the hands of the Duke of Brunswick, and remained for a long time in prison ; until the prayers of the old party in Lubeck, urging his condemnation on the ground of his having 1 Hvitfeldt, 1535. His remains were after some time conveyed to Odensee, and buried under a tomb bearing this inscription : — " Anno 1535, 2ndo Junii, Johannes de Hoya, et Nicolaus de Teckelnborg, Comites, in hostili Lubecensium acie caesi prope Assens ad regionem Oxeberg ibique sepulti, Christiani III. Begis Victoris pio jussu hue translati." His wife died of grief at Revel in 1537, when Gustavus bestowed upon her son (Count) Peter Brahe"his hereditary possessions. Chap. XI. SIEGE OF COPENHAGEN. 211 provoked a needless and fatal war against Denmark and Gustavus, prevailed, and he shared the fate of his colleague. 1 Copenhagen still held out, suffering, after it was abandoned by the Lubeckers and closely pressed by the Duke, the most dreadful extremities of famine. After the supplies of ordinary and wholesome food were exhausted or reduced to the lowest pittance the wretched inhabitants were fain to feed on horses and dogs, and quarrelled with each other for the very vermin and garbage of the kennel. Despair and misery stifled all the softer feelings. To lessen the demand upon the stores more than two hundred of the oldest and poorest inhabitants were murdered in the streets and houses of Copenhagen, and the autho- rities connived at the horrible outrage. 2 Men and women dropped down in the streets and died of hunger ; and yet, so desperate were the minds, and so hardened the hearts of the Burgomaster and Council, that when some of the burghers went to them, and, painting the sore distress, entreated them to give up the struggle, they were told "to go home again, for they had not yet eaten their own children, as they had done at Jerusalem." The only relief to the revolting selfishness of this dark scene is one single trait of maternal tenderness fearfully yet most touchingly displayed. Two infants were seen sucking blood from the breasts of their 1 Tegel, 1536. 8 Hvitfeldt, 1536 : Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 75. p 2 212 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XI. dying mother, who — the natural stream of nourish- ment being dried up — thus attempted to stifle the cries and prolong the existence of her unhappy offspring. 1 It was not until the 29th of July, 1536, when it had been besieged a year and a day, that Copenhagen surrendered, and in 1537 the cause of the captive King, and of those members of his family who were successively set up in his stead, of Albert of Meck- lenburg, who had married his niece, and of the Palsgrave Frederic, who had married his daughter, having become well nigh hopeless, the coronation of Christian the Third was celebrated with the usual rejoicings. 2 The results of this war were the complete incor- poration of Denmark and Norway — the independent council of the latter being abolished — which constitu- tion continued up to 1814, and the permanent esta- blishment of the reformed religion in that realm. 1 This seems to be the most natural explanation of a fact which Hvitfeldt says more than a thousand people witnessed. Some of my readers will remember the pretty epigram of (Emilianus in the Antho- logia : — " EAke, T&hav, irapb, firjTphs iv bvneri paQv ajii\^is "EhKvtrov tiar&Tiov vafia KaTcupBifievijs 'HStj y&p l-Kpeeffo-i \tiroirvoos aWa t& fiTyrpbs George Norman for sundry gold, silver, plate, Sea., collected by him in East and Westgothland on the King's behalf." Nerby. gard, 23rd February, 1541— E. R., fol. 124 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 157. " Authority to the Bishop of Vesteras, &c. &e., to hold a visitation in Smaland, &c, and to retain for the good of the State all the silver not actually used in Divine Service." Calmar, 20th July, 1541.— E. R., fol. 173 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 167. Chap. XIII. RELIGIOUS REFORM. 235 Some instances of gross ignorance among the priest- hood were detected in one of Norman's visitations. A Westgothland priest, being asked " What is the Gospel?" answered, "Baptism," and said, "We had nothing to do with the Old Testament; as it had been lost in the Flood!" 1 After the war was over, a finishing hand was put to the Reformation, as far as. legislation could accom- plish it, by the ordinance of Vesteras in 1544. The King, nobles, bishops, merchants, and commons then solemnly pledged themselves never to forsake the reformed religion. Pilgrimages, saint worship, and the ceremonies especially Romish, were forbidden. Some few saints' days, as set forth in the new calen- dar, were still retained; and the people (lest amid these changes they should forget, their obligations) were exhorted to frequent the Lord's table, to send their children to school, and to pay their tithes, from land or water, with punctuality. 2 From this time the King bestowed the episcopal title only on the Archbishop of Upsala ; the other bishops were called ordinaries, and were appointed to dioceses the limits of which were considerably diminished, " the old dioceses having been so large that the bishops could not visit and have such over- sight over the clergy as necessity required." The dioceses of Upsala and Linkbping were thus divided 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 111. s Prestestandets Archiv., Swenska Eccles. Handb.,. 1500-1599, vol. i. No. 39 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 192. 236 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. into three, Vesteras and Strengness each into two new sees. 1 In 1544 also the King, as the earthly head of the reformed Church in Sweden, ordered a day of general supplication to deprecate the short harvest with which the kingdom was threatened through the excessive rains. He had before claimed an absolute supremacy both in Church and State. " Look after your houses and lands, your wives and children, your flocks and herds," he said to the people of Upland in 1540, "but do not prescribe bounds to us in respect to government or religion. It is for us, on behalf of God and justice, after all natural right as a Christian King, to give you laws and ordinances, so that if you would avoid our anger and punishment you will be obedient to our royal commands both in worldly and spiritual things." 2 A moral support had been given to the throne for which such an extensive prerogative was claimed, at Orebro, on the 4th of January, 1540, when the Crown was made hereditary in the male line. At Vesteras, in 1544, the hereditary succession was con- firmed and Eric appointed Arf-Konung (Heir-King, or Crown Prince). The King's long illness in 1539, the attempt upon his life, and the insurrection in 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 98. It was not till 1557 that the general form of appointment to a divided see was given out, setting forth the reasons for reducing the limits of the dioceses existing up to that time. "Vesteras, 19th June, 1557. — Thys., vol. ii. p. 396. From this it would seem that the divisions of the dioceses mentioned by Geijer were subse- quent to 1557, but he gives no dates. 2 Letter to the Commons of Disting, 1540. — E. E., apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 99. Chap. XIII. RESULTS OP THE DACKE WAR. 237 Sm§,land, facilitated the passing of these measures, to the great though secret discontent of the nobles. 1 A standing army, more completely and extensively organized than before, was another fruit of the Dacke war, and gave stability to the throne, both by the physical force which it placed at the disposal of the monarch, and the employment it afforded to the population of the districts the most pinched for a maintenance, and therefore the most prone to rebel- lion. In the year 1540 we find Gustavus writing to the Dalesmen, and endeavouring to reconcile them to their burdens by the exemption they enjoyed from military service. " You appeal often (he says) to old and former customs, but, if you will consider what old and former customs were, you will find that they were nothing else but to be disobedient, disloyal, and unfaithful to the proper lord and ruler of the kingdom, &c. : at the same time to take knapsack in hand, and leave wife and children, to march against the enemies of the kingdom ; and whether you did yourselves any good by those old and former customs we leave you to judge. We trust, however, that, since we have had the government, we have so maintained it with soldiers that you have not been much engaged in war with its enemies, but have sat at home at ease with your wives and children, looking after the interests of your fami- lies." In January, 1543, however, we find him re- cruiting in the Dales, and putting the military service 1 Tegel, 1540 ; Scoiid. Illust., torn. v. p. 97. 238 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. in an agreeable point of view by giving earnest money of two or three marks to each of the young recruits, with a promise of regular monthly pay, as soon as they joined the other troops engaged to crush the Dacke insurrection. After quiet was restored, having doubtless seen reason to be satisfied with this mea- sure, he not only retained in his service many of the Dalesmen then enlisted, but continued to increase his forces from the same district. 1 Only a small portion of the enlisted were called out in peaceable times ; they remained at home pro- viding for themselves, receiving at first a yearly pay of six marks, which was afterwards doubled ; but not without a characteristic struggle on the part of the King. The pay on actual service, when the troops were subsisted at their own expense, was — as Gus- tavus had promised — much higher. Every foot-soldier of the army on the Russian frontier in 1 558 received four marks a month, or four times the peace allow- ance, every lieutenant five marks, and every captain six. The pay of a horse-soldier was eight, and was complained of as insufficient. Additional troops were brought from Germany in 1543 ; but by far the greatest proportion of the army was composed of natives-, the ratios being, in 1557 — of infantry, 12,934 native to 549 German ; of cavalry, 1379 to 296. 2 1 Letter to Dalesmen, 27th October, 1540, Dip. Dal., 553 ; Letter to Lass6 Jasperson, 24th January, 1543, Dip. Dal., 565. s 0. Adlesparre, apud Greijer, vol. ii. p. 111. When in 1545 the Dalesmen complained of the six marks a-year a' 'owed them at home Chap. XIII. PEOMOTION OF LEARNING. 239 Gustavus, who had felt the inconvenience of being without Swedish officers of State sufficiently skilled in German and Latin to carry on the foreign correspondence satisfactorily, or of knowledge enough in civil law and finance to promote the reforms he meditated, in 1540 took steps towards reviving the University of Upsala, and making provision there for suitable professors. 1 This for the future supply. With the same view, from his own purse, and some- times from other people's, 2 he enabled young men of promise to study on the Continent. In the mean time he continued to avail himself of the service of able men from abroad, as of Norman and Conrad Peutinger, or Von Pyby, as he called himself; an adventurer who came from the Netherlands in 1538, rose rapidly in the favour of Gustavus, and became his Chancellor, but afterwards fell into disgrace, and, being convicted of embezzlement, died at Vesteras after some years of imprisonment as insufficient, Gustavus told them that they had great reason to he content, for they were hound hefore God and man to defend their country, even if they got nothing for it. — E. E., fol. 11 ; Dip. DaL, 592. 1 Letter to Nils Manson, Vesteras, August, 1538 ; E. E., fol. 153 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 103. Upsalensem instaurat academiam, quas hactenus xx. propemodum annis fuisset desolata." — Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 86. 2 Letter to the Burgomaster and Council of Stockholm to send 100 ■dollars to Dantzic on account of Olof Larson, Grispholm, 31st August, 1543.— E. E., fol. 150 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 189. To the Bishop and Chapter of Strengness the King writes in May, 1544, requiring them to advance to Bennet Olson the students' rents which had accrued during the last year or two. " If," he adds, " you can hesides assist and hefriend him, we shall he glad." — E. B., fol. 140 ; Thys., vol. ii. p. 221. 240 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. An elaborate scheme for the ecclesiastical and civil reform of the country, framed by the counsels of these two, including a stringent system of mounted police, seems not to have been brought into operation generally. But a part perhaps of that scheme, after- wards more fully developed by the King, and drawn out with his own hand — viz. the establishment of a board of public accounts, consisting of an accountant-general and four members, and of a regular system of book- keeping, of rules for passing the accounts at given periods, and for furnishing the King with a balance- sheet, so that he might at a glance understand his financial position — was a lasting benefit to the State. 1 The King's correspondence shows that he was ever on the alert to promote, together with the higher in- terests, the material prosperity of Sweden, to embel- lish it by means of art and science ; and for these purposes to avail himself of the resources of more advanced and polished kingdoms. Thus we find him writing to Amsterdam for engineers, architects, and painters ; to Utrecht for painters, sculptors, and car- pet-weavers ; to Lubeck for a good apothecary, phy- sician, and surgeon ; to various places for miners, copper-founders, gunmakers, stovemakers, goldsmiths, builders, stonemasons, glassblowers, and gardeners. 2 Upon his mines a large share of attention was 1 Tegel, 1552 ; Dalin, vol. iii. ch. vi. p. 331. s Letters in the Eiks. Register in 1539, 1541, and 1549, referred to by Dalin, vol. iii. ch. vi. p. 1. Hans Freise was engaged to set all the King's gardens in order during the summer, but in winter to weave damask for the Queen. Chap. XIII. INTERNAL POLITY. 241 bestowed. He first provided for their effectual drain- ing, and, as they were not only a public but a local benefit, he required the towns and people in the neighbourhood to assist in that operation. Thus, to drain the old copper-mine, the town of Gefle' had to supply two good cables, and the peasants of the dis- trict a certain amount of labour. 1 Labour being scarce in the mining districts, he diverted thither a part of the surplus population of the Dales, by the promise of constant employment. He entered into the minutest details of cost and management, re- quired the most exact account of the fuel consumed in the production of the ores ; and when his son Eric informed him that at Garpeberget a certain quantity of wood produced a certain quantity of ore, he in- quires whether he is to understand pure ore, as, with- out knowing that, he might be deceived in his calcu- lation. 2 To cheapen the cost of fuel at the silver- mine he wrote himself to the East Dalesmen, wishing to know " why he should pay more for wood delivered there than others charged for better wood delivered at the copper-mine," and finished by settling the price he was content to give. 3 The half-tun of ore at the eastern silver-mine, according to the official accounts sent to the King, produced less silver than formerly ; he directs Jochim, the silver-merchant, and Olof 1 Letter to the town of Grefle, 26th January, 1553 ; E. E., fol. 12 ; Dip. Dal., 802 ; Lett. E. E., 1556 ; R. E., fol. 167 ; Dip. Dal., 842 ; see Appendix to this Chapter. * Letter to Duke Eric, 25th October, 1554 ; Dip. Dal., 828 3 Letter, 26th March, 1551 ; R. E., fol. 67 ; Dip. Dal., 775 : E 242 - GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. Xltt. Knutson to ascertain on the spot how much it actually produced, and at the same time to have an eye (without being observed) to the local overseers ; also to inform him whether the half-tun there were not larger than at Sala. 1 Only five years before his death he enjoins his sons Eric and John to see that the silver and other mines be provided with wood, charcoal, and other neces- saries, while it was still the season to sledge ; to take advantage of the same season to transport the lead from the mines ; and, in sending them the sealed-up keys of the lead-warehouse, he suggests that they had better not let them go out of their possession. 2 The great copper mine, notwithstanding the King's exertions in 1533, did not pay expenses, and in 1554 was not at work ; but that at Garpenberg was highly remunerative, and the silver-mine at Sala, which in the year 1506 produced 32,216 marcs (lodiga) of silver, in the year 1539, after Gustavus had freed it from water, produced 47,994 marcs. 3 The prin- cipal iron-mines in the kingdom had in 1532 been given up to a German named Piper, and a company which was chartered for the purpose of introducing into the country persons skilled in mining. As they 1 Letter dated Gripsholm, 12th September, 1548 ; R. R., fol. 170 ; Dip. Dal., 730. s Letter dated Grripsholm, 20th January, 1555 ; B. R., fol. 10 ; Dip. Dal., 831. 8 G-eijer, vol. ii. p. 130. The silver produced at Sala in 1842 was only 3717, at Fahlun in the same year, 395 ; together, 4112 marks. — Porsell. Stat., p. 167. Chap. XIII. INTERNAL POLITY. 243 failed to fulfil that part of their contract to the King's satisfaction, he himself took the thing in hand, brought over from the continent smelters and smiths, and established several smelting-houses and forges for iron and steel : and from these private establish- ments of the King the manufacture of bar-iron spread throughout the kingdom. Gustavus paid particular attention to this article, complaining when he found it defective, and requiring the different founders to place upon it a particular mark, that they who brought the Swedish iron into disrepute by their bad workmanship might be known and punished. 1 The manufacture, it need scarcely be said, is now one of the chief resources of the country, and it is from the best Swedish iron that London and Sheffield supply the cutlery which is the admiration of the world. Gustavus, though in some points he gave just offence to the farmers, was upon the whole well entitled to be called their friend. By a revived system of taxation, the leading principle of which was to assess the laud, not according to the number of occupants, but according to its extent and other circumstances, he relieved the smaller farmers from an oppressive injustice. 2 At the same time he dis- couraged by every argument and legitimate means the crowding of families on farms too small for their 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 131. Letter to the Hammersmiths in the diocese of Vesteras, 14th August, 1550 ; E. R., fol. 124 ; Dip. Dal., 765. 8 Letter to the Dalesmen, 27th October, 1540 ; R. R., fol. 63 ; Dip. Dal., 553. R 2 244 aUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XTIT. maintenance — finding employment (as we have seen) for some at the mines, for others in the army ; and inducing others to make farms for themselves in the yet uncleared forests. " Sweden and Finland," writes the King, " are, God be praised, of such wide extent that there is not much need to seek or cry out for space for corn-fields or meadows, or any other sort of productive lands. 1 He did not approve of the farmer eking out a maintenance by combining a petty trade with his proper vocation. "Let farmers remain farmers," he said, echoing and enforcing an existing law, " and tradespeople tradespeople ; if farmers want to be tradespeople, let them go and live in the market-towns." 2 His counsels extended sometimes to small and ob- vious, but probably neglected, points of husbandry. He exhorted the farmers to plant hop-gardens, to build kilns, to drain their corn-fields, and to ring their swine, 3 At a State-meeting at Upsala in 1546, where all luxury of dress was forbidden, the King's hand appears in the appended maxim — " The com- mon people's best pride and ornament is to have their corn-fields, meadows, and other lands well culti- vated and in good condition, with malt and meal in the garner, and meat in the house." 4 He discouraged |he manufacture °f brandy both on moral grounds * .Letter to the Bast and West Dalesmen, 21st September, 1553 ; E. E., fol, 74 ; Dip. Dal., 811 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p, 130. s Letter dated Vesteras, 19th January, 1544 ; E. E., fol. 3 ; Dip. pal., 674. 9 Geijer-, vol, ii, p, 127, < D,alin, vol. iii. ch. vii. Chap. XIII. INTERNAL POLITY. 245 and because of the quantity of corn consumed by it. He himself farmed on a large scale. In the latter half of his reign he had farms, purchased by himself, in all parts of the kingdom, in several of which both agriculture and the rearing of cattle were conducted on a large scale. At Gripsholm Queen Margaret had the superintendence of so large a dairy-farm that it required two-and-twenty maid- servants to manage it. 1 In many of the estates there were the usual results of gentleman-farming : they did not pay ex- penses. On the other hand, no doubt, the breed of cattle was improved, and the public profited at the cost of the amateur. In central Sweden, covered with immense tracts of pine-wood, it was Gustavus's policy to encourage the clearing of space for new farms, but he forbade this in the oak and beech forests of the south, which were of less extent and more valuable. These he protected from trespass by heavy penalties ; while, by the intro- duction of saw-mills, for which the numerous streams of Sweden afforded great facilities, he turned her forest-wealth to the best account. 2 The only trace of a game-law which has fallen under my eye is a prohibition to destroy the elks in the forests of Dale- carlia, though these, like the fisheries, were preserved not for sport but for revenue. 3 1 Stjemeld, apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 125. a Tegel. According to a rough estimate, the number of saw-mills of all sorts in Sweden in 1842 was about 4600.— Forsell's Statist, p. 130. " Gripsholm, 15th April, 1548 ; Dip. Dal., 721. " The skin (of the elk) is convertible to many purposes and is very valuable." Mr. 246 GTJSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. If Gustavus must yield the palm to other royal road-makers, he was not inattentive' to a matter of so much importance : he meditated also the establish- ment of public carriages, an accommodation of which Sweden until lately was wholly deficient, and he both projected and commenced the canal of Vaddo, which was completed only in the present age. 1 During a considerable part of his reign the treaty with Lubeck was a stone about the King's neck, and prevented any exertions for opening fresh channels of foreign commerce. But he was no sooner freed from that encumbrance than he strove to establish commercial treaties wherever an opportunity offered. He corresponded with James the Fifth of Scotland, with a view of promoting between that country and Sweden a trade in horses; and concluded a treaty with England in 1550, which caused a temporary suppression of a company of the Hanse Towns in London, called the Steel-yard Company, who, how- ever, recovered their privileges under Mary in 1555. 2 His maxim that the navigation of the seas ought to be free did not prevent his applying, in 1556, to that Queen (but in vain) to forbid her subjects trading to Archangel, and to enjoin them rather to go to Elfs- Grieff says, — " It is not long since that a regiment was clothed with buff waistcoats made from the hides of those animals, which were so thick that a ball could scarcely penetrate them." He adds further, " that when made into a pair of breeches a pair of them among the peasantry of former days went as a legacy for several generations." — Lloyd's Northern Field Sports, vol. ii. p. 301. 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 137. s Dalin, vol. iii. ch. i. pp. 6-8. Chap. XIII. COMMERCIAL MEASURES. 247 borg (near Gottenborg), "which lies in the Atlantic and has a good harbour." Had the boon been granted it might not at first have been very valuable, for the burghers of 'this favoured town were, it seems, simple- minded folks, who had not yet learned the true trick of trading. Instead of combining, they " got about the ships and merchants fresh come in, like a herd of swine," as the King complains, and so ran up the price of the wares imported. 1 To give a further impulse to the foreign commerce, Gustavus, having ascertained what assortments of Swedish goods were best for obtaining in return — from France salt and wine ; from England cloth, tin, and lead ; from the Netherlands silks, linen, spices, and sugar ; from Denmark saltpetre and hops ; from Germany swords, armour, brass-wares, haberdashery, or miscellaneous goods, — circulated throughout the trading towns the result of his inquiries. A plan to set up Helsingfors in Finland as the rival of Revel and Riga failed: but a year before the King's death the foreign commerce of the country — the exports of which were copper, iron, wood, tar, butter, fish-oil, seal-oil, salmon, eels, hides, goats, and horses — em- ployed sixty-two ships, the aggregate burthen of which was 3150 lasts. 2 To protect this commerce, and to maintain the honour and security of the kingdom, Gustavus 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 136. 2 Stjernman, Commerce och. (Econ. Forordningar, vol. i. p. 109 ; J. Bergius, Stockholm for 200 ar sedan]; apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 135. 248 GHJSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. established a navy, the want of which he had often occasion to lament in the earlier part of his career. Skilful shipbuilders, brought over from Venice, built him galleys after the Venetian pattern, and of them the Fins learned so well that they soon excelled their masters. Some of his men-of-war were of great size. The " Elephant," employed in the war with Lubeck, carried more guns, but of less calibre, than an English seventy-four, and, besides a crew of 300 men, hady accommodation for 1000 soldiers. 1 / When we consider that these plans, embracing so great a Variety of objects, were for the most part originated of modified by Gustavus personally ; that numerous documents and a Voluminous correspond- ence exist for their regulation and development, dic- tated, if not written, by himself; that, not leaving it wholly to subordinates to work out the schemes which he had suggested or adopted, he pursued them often into the minutest details of their operation, and that, if there was any failure, or want of progress, he was not satisfied until he had ascertained the cause and applied a remedy, — we may well be surprised at the amount of labour which one man, in the space of a few brief years, was able to accomplish. His advice to his sons, however, in some degree explains the mystery. " You should," he said, ".con- sider well, execute with vigour, and stick to your purpose, putting off nothing until the morrow. Re- solves not carried out at the right moment are like 1 Dalin, vol. iii. chap. vi. ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 139. Chap. XIII. HIS COKEESPONDENCE. 249 clouds without rain in a sore drought." l His own purposes, never needlessly procrastinated, like clouds pouring out their riches in due season upon a parched but not ungrateful soil, were followed, year by year, by harvests continually increasing in variety and abundance. LETTERS, &c, ILLUSTRATIVE OF THIS CHAPTER. No. 1. Gustavtis to tte Soldiers enlisted in the Ddlesi Stockholm, January 6th, 1545. We are informed that some of you give out that you neither can nor will serve us for the pay we give you at present, viz. six marks (ortuger) a-year, but ask that your pay may be increased. Now it seems to us, good fellows, that you are, in such a request, altogether unreasonable. For if you will only con- sider the thing properly, and as it really is, you will perceive that far greater favour and grace is shown you than any of your forefathers ever experienced from any former king or ruler of the kingdom, inas- much as, if we even gave you no such pay, you would still be in duty bound before God and all the world 1 Geijer, vol. ii> p. 118. 250 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. (in common with the other people of the realm) to serve against its enemies, when necessity required. But now, out of our especial good will and grace, we give you that pay, though you absolutely render us no service in return, but remain at home looking after your own interests with your wives, children, friends, and kindred ; and have scarce any of you so much as crossed the road for the pay aforesaid. We cannot, therefore, but think that we do more than we ought, and more than any ruler or prince before us ever did, and yet they had such help from the Dale districts, that their services were always willingly, and in such force as the Prince required, available against the enemies of the kingdom, as often happened in former times ; and within our own remembrance at Vesteras, at Balingas, and at Brannkyrka, on Good Friday at Upsala, and since, in our time, when they went out with us. Yet then they were not given one penny, and did their duty notwithstanding as faithful Swedes, without grumbling or ill-will. Now, we much prefer paying the State's money to you, who are born in the kingdom, than to foreign troops ; and this with the design of gaining your good will and thanks ; also, we had rather maintain you than strangers, and therefore considered that we had earned from you more thankfulness than we in fact perceive. However, we have little more to say, than that, if in these peaceable times, and while we make no more use of you than at present, you are willing for such a fair yearly pay to remain in our and the Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 251 kingdom's service, we are still willing to let you enjoy it ; if not, please yourselves ; only let us know in time, and then no doubt we shall be able to find foreign troops as we have hitherto done. But if in these peaceable times you are content with the afore- said pay (and in all reason you cannot be otherwise), when at any future time we require your services against our or the kingdom's enemies, we will in- crease your pay according to what is fair and reason- able. * * And we pray that you will bethink you, and consider that we could not so throw away and unthriftily spend the kingdom's money, except greater need and danger were stirring than there is. Fur- thermore, let our commandant, Lars Jasperson, know your decision, that he may when he comes hither in- form us of it. Dip. Dal., 592. No. 2. Later in the year he writes to his general, Nils Larson, that he " is content that he should, give each of the soldiers enlisted by him in the eastern Dales six marks in hand, provided it was reckoned to them as a half-year's pay." R. R., 1545, p. 209 ; Dip. Dal., 606. 252 GtJSTAVUS VASA; Chap. XIII. No. 3. Chlstavus to Prince JEria. DEAR SoN, Vasby, November 20th, 1554. This is to inform you that we had with us lately a foreign hydraulic engineer, named Jacob Essell, who informs us that he and two smiths asso- ciated with him, named Peter Jordan and Hans Hjelmsmed, have lately discovered a remarkable manner of raising water out of mines which are a hundred fathoms deep and more, and we have never heard of such a power as he says he has thereby at command, so that with one horse he can raise out of a pool, upon a wheel, so much water, that it shall fall upon the wheel in a broad stream, and eleven skoer (feet?) high, and even more; and that the water which is thus raised shall drive and raise the rest, so that by the same contrivance all the water can at last be drained from the mines. He has also given us to understand that he can mechanically raise heavy weights of all kinds, and that he can construct mills of every description ; for instance, flour-mills, powder- mills, hammer-mills, and saw-mills, in still and stand- ing water. At the same time he can raise water, both stagnant and flowing, as high as is wished, both up to castles and other places. And the aforesaid Jacob, who has engaged himself in our service, both upon his own and his comrades' behalf, has now gone to Germany to fetch them, and has promised to return with them in the beginning of the year with the first open water. Nya Handlingar rdrande Skandinaviens Hist., Stockholm, 1843, 16 Del., p. 1. Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE, 253 No. 4. Gustaws to the East Dalesmen, Sripsholm, March 26th, 1551. We give you to understand, all you our com- mons (Dannemen) who dwell in the eastern Dales, and are accustomed to cut wood for the use of the works at the old silver-mine, that we are informed you do us great injustice in the cutting, in that you cut the wood much shorter and smaller than you do at the copper-mine, and always sell every pile (staffrum) l dearer than it is worth there. Now, as it is well known the wood has to be carried much farther at the copper-mine than at the old silver-mine, and that at the copper-mine they do not pay more than two ore for a fair pile of mine-wood both for the cutting and carriage, whereas upon the old silver-mine you take for some piles of mine-wood two ore and a sixth, and for some two ore and a third ; from this sort of dealing we suifer great injury, and we do not see that we are bound to throw away our money more than others, and we think we have deserved of you to have our wood as cheap as any one. Therefore it is our will and injunction that you will henceforth amend your ways, and let us have as great advantages as others are accustomed to enjoy, cutting and carrying good and fair piles of wood both for the mine and for the furnace to the aforesaid old silver-mine works, and we will pay you for every pile 1 The pile, or staffrum, is about a cubic yard. 254 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. of mine-wood delivered up at the silver-mine two ore, and for every pile of furnace-wood delivered at our smelting-houses two ore; hoping that you will herein prove yourselves obedient subjects. 1 E. Ri, p. 53 ; Dip. Dal., 775. No. 5. Oustavus to the Commons of the Town of Gefli. Calmar, January 26th, 1553. We give you to understand, trusty subjects, that, for the advantage of the inhabitants of the kingdom generally, we have resolved to drain and clear out the old Copperberg's mine, in order that the poor men who live there may again benefit thereby, and that the Crown also may reap more advantage than is possible in its present state. And seeing that, amongst many other things which we must be at the expense of, certain ropes are especially needed, it is our gracious will and request that you, trusty subjects, come to our assistance from, the town of Gene with two good cables of such length and thickness as our 'architect, Powell Schutz, shall point out to you. If this be arranged according to our desire, we shall graciously remember it on your behalf. R. R., 1553, fol. 12 ; 8Q2. 1 Eight ore" —■ 1 mark. See Appendix. Chap, XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 255 No. 6. . Gustavus to Ms Overseer, Eric Michelsson. Calmar, January 28th, 1553. We gather from thy letter, Eric Michelsson, that the, Coppermine remains still in its old plight, so that it does not repay the cost and trouble expended upon it. This bad news we are very unwilling to hear, and should be glad if thou wouldst just contrive for once to send us better. We will also have thee admonished that thou exert thyself more for our interest than has hitherto happened, if indeed we are to agree long together. As thou givest us to understand that the peasants will forthwith bring to the mine the timber and what else shall be needed for the building which M. Powell is to erect there, and that the dams are now ready — this we are not sorry to hear, and have written to M. Powell to go thither immediately and complete the building. In regard to thy request for a contribution in money or provisions from Helsingland for the support of the carpenters who shall be at work at the mine, we are astonished that thou shouldst not have written to tell us how many they will be, and what provision upon a fair allowance they will require. When thou shalt have informed us upon these points we will give a further answer. We have also written to the burghers of Gefle to provide us with the two cables required at the old 256 • GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. mine, and that they should do so by way of an aid to us. We have also commanded M. Powell to let the burghers know how long and thick the said cable ropes should be. As thou sayest that the miners pray that we will assist them this winter with meal, which they will pay for, we should not be indisposed thereto if we knew how much meal was required, and how much we should get for the spann. After we know this we will let thee hear further on the subject. P.S. We send thee 200 marks for the use x)f the works, E. E., 1553, fol. 14 ; Dip. Pal., 803. No.. 7. Gustavus to his Overseer, Basmus Ragvaldson. Stockholm, February 10th, 1554. This is to inform thee that we have agreed with the bearer of this letter, George Powelson, steel- smith, that he shall proceed to Betsberg, and there erect a steel-forge on our account ; and it is our will that thou arrange it so that the aforesaid George be placed in the smithy with the other hammersmiths, who forge bar-iron : we also command thee to let him have in the said smithy the room he may re- quire, likewise what provisions he may need, while at his work ; and we wish thee to know that we have agreed to give him twelve 'ore for every shippund of steel he can forge. B. B„ 1554, fol. 18 ; Dip. Dal., 824. Chap. XIII. HIS COERESPONDENCE. 257 No. 8. Gustavus to Ms Overseer, Ions Pedersson. Stockholm, February 17th, 1554. Know, Ions Pedersson, that the bearers of this letter, Martin of Raffwalshytta and Laghe of Bergsang, have been before us here, and informed us that they who live close to the Garpeberg mine humbly pray that they may be allowed to procure and smelt (bruka) copper as they have done afore- time, and they have promised to give us every tenth pound of all the copper produced by their operations ; and that we are contented that they shall work upon these terms. Thou must however contrive that when- ever they set up and smelt copper, some one may be always on the spot who may be on the look-out to see that we are treated fairly, and that they have not the opportunity of concealing or abstracting any part, and thus diminishing the tithe which they have promised. 1 E. E., 1554, fol. 22 ; Dip. Dal., 825. No. 9. Gustavus to Marcus Hammarsmed. Upsala, June 6th, 1553. We have understood that you mean to com- mence the hammersmithy at Fallsbro upon a very 1 On the 19th April, 1552, Gustavus had written to his overseer at Betsberget, complaining that some took the ore home and there smelted it, which gave them an opportunity of dealing with the portion they procured as they pleased. He concludes by requiring them to erect their smelting-houses close to the mine. S 258 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII, grand and extravagant scale, and to set up two forges in one building — as if it were to be some cathedral — according to your usual wont. Now you must un- derstand that we in no wise wish you to build such grand cathedrals, and at such a heavy cost, since it does not much signify what the building is, providing the forge be good. C^eijer, vol. ii. p. 132. No. 10. i Gustams tp the East and West Dalesmen. Pramby, September 21st, 155,3. ******* You are well aware that we have given to those enlisted in our service, both in your parishes and in other parts of the kingdom, our money year by year^ in order that, if necessity arose, we might have an efficient force to employ against the enemies of the kingdom. But we have now ourself seen that they, who have enlisted troops on behalf of ourself and the realm, have been careless whether the troops taken into our service were efficient or not, and so have taken useless, timid striplings and young boys, no less than serviceable, manly, and strong young men — from which carelessness both we and the kingdom have suffered much damage. In order therefore, dear subjects, that our money may be expended here- after to the most advantage for, the Sta;te, &c. &c, we should be glad that you who are come to a ripe age, and have more understanding than the young Chap. XIU. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 259 generation, that has grown and shot up within the last few years, will give your assistance, so that we may have in our service the most serviceable, smartest, and strongest young fellows to be found in your parishes, and that the useless, boyish lot, that can render no service for the pay they receive, may be discharged. Furthermore, dear subjects, as the Dale districts are populous, and upon one farm three, four, and in some places more couples are located, so that they cannot provide themselves with a maintenance from their farms, but must needs seek a livelihood else- where, and have many of them been accustomed ac- cordingly to leave their district and work for their support — we would willingly arrange it so that they who wish to earn money, et cetera, but do not wish to go far in search of them, should find employment nearer at hand, viz. at our mines, both at the copper- mine, at the east and west silver-mines, and other places. Therefore let those of you who" are inclined to earn money proceed to the said mines, and you shall have such fair wages as you receive elsewhere. E. E., 1553, fol. 74 ; Dip. Dal., 811. No. 11. Gustams to the Parishioners of Swardsjo. Linkopiiig, February 17th, 1555. We have understood that some of you will not fully adopt the fatherly counsel and injunctions which we have often given you, that they who have not s 2 260 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. farms to cultivate and live by should clear away and make farms for themselves in the woods, where they can find the opportunity, and not hang and press upon one another, two, three, four, and more upon one farm, which in this district has been much the case, and through which many farms are subdivided, 1 the Crown rents diminished, and almost all who so press upon each other impoverished and crushed to the earth. The present dearth and dear time in this district has been occasioned by this, — that the one presses so on the other as aforesaid, and that only a part will willingly follow our fatherly counsel, while some, we understand, will not follow it, but enclose the whole adjoining country for the poor advantage gained by them from the wild birds and beasts which they capture in the forest. This we can by no means per- mit any longer, but now, as before, make known by this our public proclamation that they who desire to take up and clear away farms where there is oppor- tunity, for the benefit of the Crown, are free to do so, a Speaking of the Dalecarlians of the present day, Mr. Laing says, — "It is an evil attending their adherence to their ancient dress and modes of living, that they have acquired no habits or tastes counter- acting the tendency to over-multiplication, no expensive wants render- ing marriage incompatible with habitual gratifications or with social standing. They have, for want of these checks, married and multiplied and divided their little properties to an extent similar to what, from the same cause, takes place among the tenantry in Ireland. " Govern- ment under different reigns has attempted to check this subdivision of property by establishing a minimum, but such an arbitrary inter- ference with the rights of property of course has failed : for what law can come between buyer and seller, or parents and children in family arrangements?" — Laing's Sweden, p. 221. Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 261 especially in places where it will not be attended with injury to other farms. And we have directed our bailiff, Ions Olofson, to assist those who are willing to take up farms upon the aforesaid conditions; for- bidding, accordingly, all to offer any hindrance or to injure in any respect the aforesaid Ions Olofson, or those who are willing to clear for themselves farms, on pain of incurring the penalty belonging to a breach of the peace. From a copy of one of the documents in Swardsjo Church. — Dip. Dal., 832. No. 12. Ghtstavus to his Bailiff at Norberg, NUs Helsing. Grripsholm, March 7th, 1551. Know, Nils Helsing, that the bearers, Lasse Nielson and Peder Truelson, have been with us, and upon behalf of the people belonging to Folkanna, By, and Grytness parishes, have asked leave to buy, during this winter and the ensuing spring, as much iron-ore as they can purchase to pay their taxes ; and now thou wilt remember, Nils, what we told thee, when we were last in the mine district, respecting this iron-making, that we could by no means permit them who do not live at the mine to carry on a pedling trade in iron, and thereby neglect and ruin their corn-lands and meadows, as hath been too much the case hitherto, to, their own and the Crown's no small damage : but we perceive that our injunctions 262 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. have borne little fruit, seeing that they still seek every opportunity- of running after iron as much as ever. And possibly it is thou who hast sent the bearers to petition for the above-mentioned conditions. If so, understand that their errand gives us small content, and that we would fain have thee discourage them from that iron-making instead of encouraging them therein. However, we are content that for this winter and the ensuing spring they may buy iron-ore at Norberg, &c. ; but another year we can by no means permit it> and this thou mayst positively tell them all. .. R. B., 1551, fol. 53 ; 774. No. 13. Gustavus to the People in the Mine Districts, and in other provinces, respecting the many Country Dealers who there drive a trade. Westerns, January 19th, 1544. We Gustavus, with God's grace, &c, proclaim, that seeing that the market-towns generally and all the silver-miners, copper-miners, iron-miners, and others who dwell in this province, as well as the market-towns and mining districts (of) Eastgothland, Westgothland, and Smaland, have now loudly com- plained of the many country traders who in Sma- land, and Westgothland, and many parts of the kingdom, travel about and, quite against the law of Sweden, drive a great country trade, and carry thereto almost all their wares, butter, oxen, horses, Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 263 and whatever else is in demand, to the great injury and ruin of the market-towns a^d of the Crown mines, inasmuch as the poor men who work the Crown mines can procure in the neighbouring towns neither oxen nor other necessaries to supply them- selves and maintain their own and the Crown's mine- works, to the great injury of the kingdom in general ; therefore have they humbly and with one mouth prayed and entreated us that we will take some course for putting down such unlawful country traders : and inasmuch as such country trading is clean Contrary to the article of the law of Sweden which provides, "whomsoever theJKing's lieutenant or officer finds driving any country trade, whether they be soldiers, pages, priests, retainers, peasants, or other men, take from him what he bought or sold and 20 marks to boot :" * * * and seeing moreover that such country traders will soon, through their un- lawful dealings, bring almost all the market-towns in the kingdom to ruin, therefore it is not fitting that we should permit or wink at such intolerable pro- ceedings : Therefore we enjoin our lieutenants, officers, and all others, and especially those in the provinces of Smaland and Westgothland, that they, upon peril of their necks, will not countenance or permit any peasants, soldiers, &c, to trade in the country in any sort of merchandise, or to permit that butter, oxen, horses, and other merchantable articles be carried out of the kingdom, in considera- tion of its actual circumstances, that provisions and 264 GUSTAVUS VASa. Chap. XIII. other wares may not rise and be so enormously dear, upon pain of the penalty aforesaid. Also we com- mand you, all the rest, who are accustomed to follow such-like country trading, to desist from it from this day, taking heed to your corn-fields, meadows, and other things with which peasants are accustomed to support themselves, letting traders remain traders and peasants peasants, as Sweden's law prescribes. If, however, any have a desire to follow trade, let them remove to the market-towns, and there trade, since they are so minded ; but if any one venture to act contrary to this our command, which in con- formity with Sweden's law and at the general voice and prayer we again enjoin, the same will have in- curred our wrath and punishment, and that penalty which is in the law provided. 1 E. R., 1544, fol. 3 ; Dip. Dal., 674. 1 Upon the restrictions in respect to country trading, which it seems are still continued, Mr. Laing very justly observes, — "The restraints upon the exercise of trades and sale of wares press heavily upon these people (the Dalesmen), whose wandering traffic in summer is abso- lutely necessary to their subsistence, as their portions of land could not keep them all the year round. It is winked at by the authorities as a matter of necessity, and complained of by the privileged tradesmen and dealers as inroads upon their rights and means of living. But, in fact, with a climate rendering the keep of servants and workmen very burdensome in winter in many branches of industry, as in agriculture, in which nothing in winter can be done, a class of people who keep themselves all winter, on their own little farm produce, manufacturing all sorts of tools and useful wares and selling them in summer for a mere living, are more suitable for the present state of Sweden than a total separation of agricultural and manufacturing labour." — Laing's Sweden, p. 233. Grustavus might himself have remembered that he was obliged to find employment for his gardeners at the loom during the long winter. Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 265 No. 14. Gustavus to the Commons of Mora Parish. Gripsholm, April 15th, 1548. We have understood that there are many among you, who would willingly conform to the law of Sweden, and in like manner to that royal prohibition which we have frequently sent forth, and more par- ticularly through our trusty men and council who were last in your district, concerning the elks which frequent your woods, which they would fain have seen permitted to range freely, to the intent that they may increase and multiply ; but we understand that there are some among you who, in defiance of the law and our royal prohibition aforesaid, do nothing else after Lady-day but go hunting after the elks, shoot, and destroy them, and often so as to kill elk and fawn together, to your own loss, &c. We therefore enjoin and solemnly command you to refrain from shooting the said elks, and that you will yourselves assist' in order that they who do so may be properly punished. E. R., 1548; Dip. Dal., 721. No. 15. Gustavus to Michael Helsing. Kungsor, April 1st, 1549. We wrote some time since to certain parishes in the Dales on the subject of some, woodcutters, &c. ; and it is now our wish and injunction that thou pro- 266 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIII. cure us up in the Dales a hundred woodcutters, letting them come immediately to our estate at Raflhess, and that thou give each in hand a mark ortiger. We have so arranged that when they come to Raffness they shall cut down and clear away certain woodlands, and afterwards scrub up the roots. Whatever more they may demand (or deserve) shall be given them : this thou mayst hold out to them. -It is also our wish that thou let us know how it fares with the works at the Coppermine, &c. E. E., 1549, fol. 77 ; 740. No. 16. Cfustavus to Anders Ersson. Kungsor. April 11th, 1549. As we understand, Anders, that meal is selling at a good price at the mine, viz. a span of corn 7 ore, a span of rye 9 ore, a span of ryemeal 10 ore', and a span of barleymeal for a mark, it is our wish and command that thou sell the miners our meal at the highest current price. E. E., 1549, fol. 97 ; 745. Chap. XIII. HIS CORRESPONDENCE. 267 s No. 17. Gustavus to his Bailiff Lasse Jasperson. Kungsor, April 7th, 1549. It being our intention to set up a little breeding- farm at the Coppermine, &c, it is our wish and request that thou make over to us thy estate at Holm, and we will give thee instead as good an estate, paying the same rent and in equally good condition ; and, if any of thy coheirs have now a share and interest therein, that thou wilt negotiate with them so that we may have the whole of the said estate at once. Thou wilt give us thy answer and determination upon this matter as soon as possible. 268 GUSTAVUS VASA/ Chap. XIV. CHAPTER XIV. Assumption by Christian of the arms of Sweden — Eemonstrance of Gustavus — War with Bussia, and treaty of peace — Death of Queen Margaret — Gustavus marries Catherine Stenbock — His will — Discontent of Eric — His proceedings at Cahnar — Seeks the hand of the Princess Elizabeth of England — Prince John's unsuccessful mission — Marriage of the Princess Catherine — Imprudent conduct of the Princess Cecilia — Grief of the King. The assumption on the part of Denmark of the three crowns, which were the arms of Sweden before the Union, threatened to interrupt in 1548 the tranquil- lity which followed the Dacke war. By the counsel of his Chancellor Fris, Christian assumed the device ; and his daughter Anna, who married the Saxon Duke Augustus in that year, paraded it on her carriages, and on an escutcheon, which hung out before the inns where she stopped on her way to Saxony. 1 To the remonstrances of Gustavus Chris- tian replied with good humour, that the Princess had no doubt been too much occupied with her nuptials to observe how her arms were emblazoned, and that it was by mere accident that the painter had placed the three crowns in such a position as to resemble the arms of Sweden. It was not a matter to resent. " Pictoribus atque poetis Quidlibet audendi semper fuit Eequa potestas." 1 Tegel. 1548. Chap. XIV. REMONSTRANCE WITH DENMARK. 269 Gustavus suffered himself to be contented for a while with this excuse ; but when, some years after, the state seal of Denmark appeared with the arms of Sweden under those of Norway and Denmark, and letters, sealed with that seal, were sent to himself, he no longer concealed his displeasure. " I am vastly astonished" (he wrote to Christian in 1557) " that so enlightened a King should in his old age have dis- covered a petulance, from which in his younger years he was free. You have taken a step, upon which neither Frederic nor any of his predecessors ever ventured. It is not the way to preserve peace and friendship. It is not what I have deserved at your hand. Neither the three lions" (Denmark's arms) " nor the axe of St. Olof " (Norway's) " would have se- cured you the throne of Denmark, if the three crowns, of which I am the rightful bearer, had refused their aid. We have hitherto lived in unity ; why should we in our latter days provoke one another ? All the world are talking of the design of Denmark to sub- jugate Sweden. You will not acknowledge such design in words ; but your deeds bespeak its existence. One more hasty than myself would have tried, ere now, sword in hand, to erase the three crowns from the Danish escutcheon. 1 But I will still be patient, to prove how anxious I am for peace." Christian replied shortly, that there was no sinister intention or insult meant by what had been done ; but rather a 1 " The Danes said it would take sharp teeth and claws to do so." — Geijer. 270 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. wish to preserve a memorial of the union which had so long existed between the three kingdoms. 1 This excuse was not well calculated to allay suspicions, and the war with Denmark, thus twice provoked, was only postponed to break out with fury after the death of Gustavus. In 1554 Kussia declared war against Sweden, on the ground that Gustavus's lieutenants had levied taxes upon twenty parishes within the Russian terri- tory. The boundaries of the two kingdoms were in fact a matter of dispute. The Russian relied upon the definition put forth in certain letters of former Kings of Sweden, of which no record remained in the Swedish chancery: Gustavus upon the boun- daries which had been recognised during the memory of the oldest of those living on the frontier. In No- vember a force of 8000 Russians crossed into Fin- land, and took away all the corn which had been re- cently gathered. 2 Another division, which marched early in the next year to Vibourg, dealing fire and slaughter wherever it went, was drowned at Rafve- lunda, where the ice gave way under them. But an army of 30,000 was soon again upon the Swedish frontier ; and so imminent was the danger, that Gus- tavus thought it necessary to be himself at the side of the generals, whom he appointed to repel the in- vader. During his absence he committed the govern- ment to his son Eric. His second son, John, accom- panied him on the expedition. 1 Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 102 ; Celsius, vol. ii. p. 327. 8 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 310. Chap. XIV. WAE AND TREATY WITH EUSSIA. 271 The campaign, however, was anything but brilliant on either side. It consisted but of reciprocal plun- derings and cruelties, and Gustavus was glad to ter- minate the unsatisfactory contest ; the rather that the cost of the war was enormous, that sickness reigned in his ranks, and that the help, which the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order and the King of Poland had promised, did not arrive. The Czar's own designs upon Livonia inclined him to accommo- dation. A truce of six months was followed by a treaty of peace, concluded at Moscow, 2nd of April, 1557, — the prisoners taken in the late war to be mu- tually released, and a meeting of 100 men of each nation to be held in 1559, at the River Woxen, to agree upon the boundary. 1 The latter years of Gustavus were marked by do- mestic misfortunes ; by the loss of his beloved queen, by the jealousies, the imprudence, and the misconduct of some of his ; children, more than by any external cause, and amid the glory which he had acquired, he felt the vanity of all human greatness. Margaret died at Tynnelso, in 1551, aged 32. She had borne the King five sons and five daughters. Of the former, two, Johnand Charles, afterwards ascended the throne ; two died in childhood ; and one, Magnus, became of weak intellect. The daughters were, Ca- therine, Cecilia, Anna, Sophia, and Elizabeth. In bidding a last farewell to her husband, the Queen said, " I thank you, my Lord, for the dignity to 1 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 324. 272 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. which you raised me, for the kindness which you have constantly shown me, and for a happy union of fifteen years. The faults of my youth and inexpe- rience my Lord will be pleased to forget." She then took his hand and kissed him ; while tears streaming from his eyes testified a heartfelt sorrow, that was never again wholly to pass away. 1 An eclipse of the sun, which happened at her death, was felt to be too appropriate an emblem of the loss experienced, both by the King and the people, in this most amiable and excellent princess, who was, says D'alin, "pious and cheerful, chaste and beautiful, and beloved for her courtesy and kind- ness to high and low." 2 Gustavus, a year after, vainly endeavoured to regain his lost happiness by contracting a third marriage with the beautiful Catherine Stenbock, then in her eighteenth year, the niece of the late Queen, and betrothed to Gustavus Johnson of the Eos family. The engagement presented no greater obstacle than in the case of Margaret, and was got over in the same way, viz. by substituting for the bride the bride's sister. The relationship was a more formidable difficulty. Inquiry having been made of the Bishop of Vesteras, who in turn consulted the Archbishop, whether a marriage between persons so related was lawful — no names were as yet given — a negative answer was returned. Upon this it was 1 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 299. * Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 106 ; Dalin, vol. iii. ch. vii. p. 429. Chap. XIV. HIS THIRD MARRIAGE. 273 thought advisable to ascertain the opinions of the Church dignitaries generally, and at the same time to inform them that the case concerned the King. Sentiments being divided, a synod to discuss the point was held at Vadstena, on the 23rd of July, 1553, when George Norman endeavoured to show that the prohibition against such marriages was only part of the ceremonial law, and that conscience ought not to be fettered in respect to them. He was un- able, however, to bring the Archbishop and the Bishops of Skara and Strengness to view the matter in that light, and they endeavoured, in a private au- dience of two hours' duration, to divert the King from his purpose, but in vain ; " the Vasa blood was up," and the marriage, sanctioned by the State Coun- cil and the majority of the clergy, took place. 1 Gustavus had in 1547 read to the States-General, assembled at Strengness, the first draft of his testa- ment, by which, as finally settled, he bestowed upon John the dukedom of Finland, upon Magnus that of East Gothland, and upon Charles that of Soderman- land, to be held as fiefs under the Crown. His avowed object was, " as his eldest son had been elected King, to provide for his younger children also a princely maintenance." In anticipation of this final arrangement, John, his favourite son, had at the age" of eleven been invested with estates in Finland, and in 1556 with the whole province. Eric was greatly dissatisfied that so much power should be conferred 1 Dalin, vol. iii. p. 7 ; Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 106. T 274 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. upon his brother, while he had as yet but an empty- title ; and to appease him the King was fain to invest him with Calmar and Kronoberg, with their de- pendencies, and Oland. Among the conditions at- tached to the investiture of Calmar, the principal were, that it should be held in strict dependence upon the King ; that from the revenues Eric should maintain 500 horse and 2000 foot for the King's service ; that he should not enter into any negotiation for peace, declare war, appoint public officers, create nobility, diminish taxes, nor impose any fresh bur- thens, without the King's consent. 1 These conditions were not well observed by Eric. The jealousy of his brother, which, according to Messenius, appeared throughout his life, so " that he quarrelled with him first for playthings, then for fiefs, and finally for the whole realm of Sweden," was fostered by his grandmother, who visited him soon after he took possession of Calmar. It seems to have been by her counsel that he exacted an oath of fidelity to himself from the inhabitants and chief officers of the King in that quarter. This step, though taken perhaps but as a precautionary measure against the presumed ambition of John, awakened in Gustavus the greatest displeasure and suspicion. He concealed his feelings indeed from the object of them, but he brought over from Germany, in consequence, a considerable force, and kept the greater part as a life-guard until his death. He sent also spies into 1 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 332 ; Geijer, vol. ii. p. 148. Chap. XIV. ERIC AT CALMAR. 275 Sni&land to give him intelligence of what was passing there. 1 It was no good report they had to bring back to the unhappy father. His discarded servants were harboured at Calmar. Brutal sports, in which limbs were lopped off and eyes knocked out, pro- voked in the prince only a madman's laughter. 2 Gustavus was well nigh resolved to disinherit him. " If this Absalom," he said, " does not blush to do these things before my face, what will he not venture to do when I am dead ?" 3 Among the Frenchmen who at Calmar were the chief companions of Eric, his former tutor, Dennis Burrey, the successor of Norman in that office, had much influence over him. Burrey, who was a zealous Calvinist, counselled the Prince to seek the hand of the Princess Elizabeth of England — advice which, though springing from a different design, tallied with that given him by his grandmother, to connect him- self with some powerful house, upon whose support he might reckon in case of dissension arising between himself and his brothers. The King's consent having been obtained with difficulty — for he feared a Cal- vinistic bride for Eric as much as Burrey desired it * • — Burrey proceeded, with Lars Knutson, to England, in 1558, to negotiate the marriage; but the affair 1 Scond. Ilhist., torn. v. p. 114. 8 Peter Brahe, apud Greijer, vol! ii. p. 151. * Dalin, toI. iii. ch. viii. p. 19. * Istara (Calvinianam) rex" Gustavus magnopere detestabatur reli- gionem. Ideoque — huic filii voto consensum diu abnuebat.— Scond. Illust., torn. v. p. 116. T 2 276 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. proceeded slowly — so slowly that the King sarcas- tically observed " he supposed Burrey must be staying in England because the air agreed with him." x How the embassy actually sped there we learn from Burnet : — " Soon after [the prorogation] the King of Sweden sent a message secretly to the Lady Elizabeth, who was at Hatfield, to propose marriage to her. King Philip had once designed to marry her to the Duke of Savoy. * * * How far she entertained that motion I do not know ; but for this from ^Sweden she rejected it, since it came not to her by the Queen's direction. But to that it was answered, the King of Sweden would have them begin with herself, judging that fit for her as he was a gentleman, and, her good liking being obtained, he would next, as a King, address himself to the Queen. But she said that, as she was to entertain no such proposition unless the Queen sent them to her, so, if she were left to herself, she assured them, she would not change her state of life. To Sir Thomas Pope, who was sent to Elizabeth by the Queen to say that she approved of her answer, she said, after reiterating her preference for a single life, ' And as concerning my liking of this same mo- tion, I beseech you say unto her Majesty, that to my remembrance I never heard of his (the ambassador's) master before this time, and that I so well like both the messenger and the message, as I shall most 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 152. Chap. XIV. ERIC'S SUIT TO ELIZABETH OF ENGLAND. 277 humbly pray God upon my knees that from hence- forth I never hear of one or the other.' " l This certainly was not very promising, but John, having obtained leave from the King to plead his brother's cause and proceeding to England, was well received by Elizabeth, though she still declared her inclination to remain single, and her stedfast purpose not to marry a foreigner whom she had never seen. Upon this Eric wrote to her, complaining that, "after so many proofs of his sincerity, and the assurances of his own brother, she still doubted his love. He had loved her (he said) while yet in adversity ; it was not therefore her rank, but her person, that he regarded. She might easily find a richer and a handsomer con- sort, but none truer, none who loved her better. She ought not to wonder at his passion for a foreigner. It was awakened by God, and by a trustworthy report of her character. Her personal appearance, too, was not unknown to him. He would, as soon as he ob- tained leave from his father, come to her, and with his own mouth assure her that for her sake he would give up his country and all that was dearest to him in the world. The project, however, must be kept secret, as he meant to travel incognito. Finally, he thanked her for her kindness to his brother, and trusted that his love, as being inspired by Heaven, would prove fortunate." 2 1 Burnet, Hist, of Reformation, vol. ii. p. 725, Oxford ed. 8 Lit. Er. ad Reg. Eliz. ; Wadstena, 30th Dec. 1559; apud Dalin vol. iii. ch. viii. 278 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. Gustavus had no such expectation, and would fain have had Eric set his mind less upon a matter of so much uncertainty, and place it in the hands of Al- mighty God. Moreover, the large outlay incurred in indulging Eric and his brother's fantasy made him very uncomfortable, and not -without reason. For, as Tegel observes, " what a sum was expended in this expedition to so magnificent a people, and in such a matter, where expense is not wont to be spared, may easily be imagined ; in fact, the cost amounted to 200,000 dollars." ' While John was prosecuting his brother's suit with the most magnificent promises, 2 hoping probably that, in the event of success, the throne or the regency of Sweden would be open to himself, the marriage of Count Edward of East Friesland with the Princess Catherine, Gustavus's eldest daughter, took place at Stockholm on the 1st of October, 1559. The dowry of the bride was 100,000 dollars, besides the trousseau^ which was magnificent. An event, however, followed close upon the mar- riage, which turned all the joy of the King and his family on the occasion into mourning. Count John, the bridegroom's brother, had become enamoured of the young Princess Cecilia, who was 1 Tegel, 1559. a Bishop Jewell wrote to Peter Martyr from London the 2nd No- vember, 1559 : — " Suecus et Oarolus Ferdinandi P. mirifloissime ambiunt. Sed Suecus impense: ille enim, modo impetret, montes argenteos pollioetur. Sed ilia fortasse thalamos propriores cogitat." — Burnet, Appendix to vol. iii. p. 383. Chap. XIV. THE PRINCESS CECILIA. 279 clever, agreeable, and of uncommon beauty. Cecilia returned his passion ; but — despairing probably of obtaining the King's consent to their union — it was in secret only that the young lovers dared to avow their mutual attachment. Both were in the cortege which accompanied the bride and bridegroom to the frontier, and, during a halt at Vadstena, the sentinel on duty saw the Count, by means of a ladder, enter the bedchamber of the young Princess. Eric, who was of the party, being informed of this, set one of his courtiers, De Mornay, on the watch the following night, the 10th of December. At midnight the Count repeated his visit, when De Mornay removed the ladder, and, having forced the door of the apart- ment, found him there and the Princess also. Eric immediately put him under arrest, and, having sent him off to Orbyhus, in Upland, wrote to inform the King of what had happened, and to ask his advice. 1 The aged King shed bitter tears over this disgrace, to which the rashness of Eric had given such wide publicity. He said to his confessor in Latin, " My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death," and desired, if it were God's will, to die, for he was weary of life. 2 To Eric's letter he said, " he was called in to give counsel as a reaper to a field already reaped. 1 Letter of Prince Erie to Prince John, Calmar, 23rd February, 1560. — B. K. K. fol. 58 ; apud Dalin, vol. iii. ch. viii. p. 29. Tegel (1559) mentions the imprisonment of John, but apologises for passing over in silence the circumstances which led to it. * Dalin, vol. iii. ch. viii. 280 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XIV. * Eric had made public this melancholy business, to the shame and derision of himself and all his house — of what use was counsel now ? " The young Prince received these reproaches with impatience, and told his father he ought not to write to his heir as to his bailiffs. "Dear son Eric," re- plied the father, " you send us many a letter, but with what pleasure we can read them God Almighty knows. For the death and passion of God's Son, and for the filial love and obedience good children should bear to their parents, desist from that martyr- dom with which you overwhelm and torture us your poor aged father." Excusing himself for his hasti- ness, he says in another letter, " We count upon you as your father, that you will not on this ground con- ceive any displeasure. God in his holy word has commanded that no one shall revile or do harm to his anointed, or to his own flesh, though defects and transgressions be at times found in them." ' Eric, sensible at length of the mistake which he had committed, sought to repair his sister's damaged honour ; but, with the same maladroitness which he had exhibited throughout the unhappy affair, he en- deavoured to accomplish his object by having a medal struck, with the chaste Susanna on one side, and Cecilia on the reverse. 2 All prayers for the culprit were for a long time fruitless ; but, after eight months' imprisonment, and 1 Geijer, vol. ii. pp. 150, 151. a Dalin, vol. iii. ch. viii. p. 30. Chap. XIV. THE PRINCESS CECILIA. 28 1 after having vindicated, as far as possible, the reputa- tion of Cecilia, he was released from prison. He remained unmarried, and, taught discretion by the past, when that Princess came to Emden on a visit to her sister, he shunned her dangerous presence. 1 She herself married the Margrave Christopher of Baden, in 1564 ; after her husband's death embraced the Roman Catholic religion ; and ended a giddy and dissolute life at the advanced age of eighty-seven. 2 1 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 345. a Geijer, vol. ii. p. 151. 282 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. CHAPTER XV. Unhappiness of Gustavus's latter days — His decline — His latest eorrespondenee — His last address to the States — Renewal of Erie's suit to Elizabeth, of, England — The King's illness and death — Peter Brahe's description of him — Eeview of his cha- racter. If Gustavus was born in 1496 he was in 1559 only sixty-three years old, but the anxieties of a difficult government, and the heavy weight of domestic sorrow, began to tell upon both body and mind. His strength visibly declined, and he became querulous and melan- choly. His cheerful temper seldom shone out with its former brightness after the death of his beloved Margaret, and even as early as 1554 we find him declaring to his sons that he no longer took any pleasure in musicj of which he had once been fond, and sending back to them, as better suited to their age and circumstances, some trumpeters and other musicians whom they had procured for his amuse- ment. 1 The loss of Margaret was followed by that of many of his contemporaries in the State Council, among the rest of Lars Siggeson- (Sparre*), his fellow- prisoner in Denmark Christina Gyllenstjerna, to 1 Gripsholm, December 25th, 1554 ; Appendix to Chron. Laurent. Petri, in Eerum Suec. Script.^ vol. ii. p, 153. See Appendix. Chap. XV. HIS DECLINE. 283 whom he was much attached, died in 1559; then came the death of the King of Denmark, from which he anticipated much evil, and in whom he regretted a good friend and neighbour. Finally, the disgrace of Cecilia cut him to the quick. No one of his age had been less superstitious, perhaps (overwhelmed as he had been with business) we might say less thoughtful, on the subject of omens ; but now he con- sidered every memorial of life's mutability and vanity as a sign for himself, and said, " That is meant for me ; God grant me time to make myself ready." Fears for the Reformation and for the future peace and union of Jiis family made the prospect of death still more gloomy. His memory, once so tenacious, began to fail him : he confused names. Something of his former decision was wanting: contrary to his wont he occasionally changed his orders. His natural defects appeared more prominently. He became habitually more irritable, and more exacting with his bailiffs and employes. 1 On the 24th of April, 1560, he was taken ill at Juleta, but recovered sufficiently to proceed in the following month to Eskiltuna, where he had the satis- faction of again embracing his favourite son John, just returned from his embassy to England. 2 He came to Stockholm on the 16th of June to attend the Diet, which had been convoked there " on 1 Collection Hist. Polit. MS. in Bibliotheca Com. Piper ; apud Dalin, vol. iii. ch. viii. 2 Tegel, 1560. 284 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. account of the King's age and weakness, and the many weighty affairs not yet brought to an end." He had written to Eric on the 3rd of June entreating him to be present, assuring him that he was not dis- satisfied with him personally, though he was dis- satisfied with his advisers. On the day following he wrote to John complaining of those toads who took advantage of Eric's naturally suspicious temper to persuade him to set spies upon his father, and to lead him into other inconceivable extravagancies. 1 These are the last letters preserved, probably the last written, by that sagacious pen which had been employed for nearly forty years with- such indefa- tigable diligence and with such fruitful, and, gene- rally speaking, with such beneficial results. On the 25th of June Gustavus, in the presence of his four sons, of whom the youngest, still a child, stood at >his knee, after his testament had been read, approved, and confirmed by oath, addressed the States in their hall of assembly : — "I thank Almighty God," he said, " for that in my person he hath restored to the Swedish throne the ancient race of Magnus Ladulas and Charles Knutson. Those of you who are some- what advanced in years can still remember the time when our beloved country groaned beneath the sway of foreign oppressors, and especially of the cruel tyrant Christian, and how it pleased God by my hand to free it from such tyranny. Therefore ought we all, high and low, master and servant, young and old, 1 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 157. Chap. XV. HIS LAST ADDRESS TO THE STATES. 285 ever gratefully to remember that providential de- liverance. For what was I, that I should dethrone so mighty a lord, the king of three kingdoms, allied and related to the Emperor and the most powerful princes of the earth ? Little could I have expected that honour when in the forest and the wilderness I hid myself from the bloodthirsty sword of the enemy. But God prospered the work, and made me his minister in whom to reveal his almighty power, so that I may well compare myself to David, whom the Lord raised up from a poor shepherd to be king over the people. " I thank you for having chosen me your heredi- tary sovereign, and for having loyally supported me in my government. That during ~my reign it has pleased God to introduce here his pure and holy word, and to bless us at the same time so highly with all temporal blessings, let us all, as is our bounden duty, humbly and thankfully praise him. I am well aware that in the opinion of many I have been a harsh king, but the time will come when the Swedes would gladly pluck me from the grave if it were in their power. I scruple not, however, to acknowledge many sins and frailties — for none is perfect and with- out spot — and I pray you as loyal subjects to pardon the faults and imperfections which you have found in my government. My design at least lias invariably been the good of my kingdom, and my grey hairs and wrinkled forehead sufficiently prove the many dangers, troubles, and sorrows I have experienced in 286 GTJSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. my forty years' reign. I take nothing with me of ail that I have gathered together ; employ it, my children, to God's honour and to your country's good. Rejoice, dear friends, over that spiritual light which in my time has arisen, and thank God for having delivered you from the thraldom of Papistry. I know that many sects and impostors will rise up among you, and I know at the -same time that the Swedes are readier to adopt new opinions than to search dili- gently for what is good and profitable. This has often grieved me, but I pray you to hold fast by God's word and reject everything that is not in conformity with it. My days will soon be ended. I need not the stars to tell me that my hour is at hand. I bear in my body the surest tokens that I see you now for the last time, and that ere long I must enter into the presence of the King of kings to give account of that princely but corruptible crown which has been given me to wear. Let your prayers follow me : remember me when you assemble in your churches ; and when at last I close my eyes, may my ashes rest in peace! The King then, after having committed the govern- ment to his eldest son, stretched out his hands and blessed his people. Himself and his auditors were alike moved to tears, and, as he was led out of the hall by John and Eric, he stopped from time to time 1 Celsius, after an account by Basmus Lndwigson, who had been Secretary in Gustavus's Chancery, and who died in 1594, and an anonymous MS. account of Gustavus's last years. — Vol. ii. j). 355. Chap. XV. HIS LAST ILLNESS. 287 to look back upon the assembly and renew his affec- tionate and reluctant farewell. 1 Eric the next day addressed the States in the High Church upon the necessity of prosecuting the English marriage in person. He was one dt those suitors who will not listen to, or understand, a refusal. Eliza- beth had refused him in French and in English, and still he turned a deaf ear. She wrote a Latin letter to Gustavus, entreating that he would think no more of her for his son, but look out for some other alli- ance. Eric ventured to suggest that his father, not being well versed in Latin, must have mistaken its import. John, who shared or pretended to share his delusion, now supported him before the State-council, and was rewarded with the Regency of the kingdom during his brother's absence. Gustavus gave his consent, but not willingly. The excitement was pro- bably too much for him. However that may be, on the 14th of August, the day of Eric's departure, he was seized with a burning heat and shivering, accom- panied by diarrhoea. He was attended by his barber- surgeon and apothecary, and his confessor, Master Johannes (minister of the High Church of Stock- holm), who also acted as his physician. The pre-^ scriptions were not successful, nor very patiently taken. Potions of violet-syrup, pomegranate, endive- water, chicory, &c, after a short experience of their inefficacy to stop the diarrhoea, were eschewed ; and the King was heard to say that he had busied himself 1 Celsius, ut supra. 288 CUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. too much with the things of this world, but all his kingdom could not now purchase him a physician. Two foreign doctors of medicine sent him by Eric arrived too late to be of service. 1 His mood during his illness was very variable ; he was at one time so harsh that his children dared not approach him ; at another low and weak even to tears ; at another gay and sportive. At the beginning of his illness he told his confessor, who began some. religious exhortation without much considering whether the patient was able to bear it, to cut it short and bring him instead some remedy for a burning head and a sick stomach. When the same clergyman urged him to confess his sins, he an- swered, " Shall I confess my sins to thee ? " 2 When one of his attendants asked him if he wanted any- thing, he replied, "The kingdom of heaven, which thou canst not give me." To his sons he said, " Men are but men! when the play is out, we are all alike." He bade those who surrounded him to make known to all that he forgave his enemies and prayed forgiveness of all whom he had offended. From a comparison of dates it would appear that the re- 1 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 358. 2 Before his last illness he had shown considerable deference to the advice of his confessor, and, being convinced by him that he had acted harshly and injuriously to his bailiffs,_he not only forgave them an arrear of 15,000 marks, but ordered them to be dealt with more indulgently for the future. — Dalin, vol. iii. p. 8 ; Celsius, vol. ii. p. 357. Uhap. XV. HIS DEATH. 289 lease of Count John was among the fruits of the relentings of his last illness. 1 The Queen, Sten Erickson (Lejonhufvud), his con- fessor, and Peter Swart, the court qhaplain, never quitted his side. During the first three weeks he talked, and sometimes with his former vigour, upon temporal and spiritual affairs ; the last three weeks were passed almost in silence, and without apparent suffering. When upon receiving the sacrament he made a confession of his faith, and his son John adjured him to remain stedfast therein, he made a sign for pen and paper and wrote — " Once confessed, and constant in the same, or a thousand times spoken — " but had not strength to finish the sen- tence. 2 His confessor was addressing him in his last moments, when Sten Erickson interrupted him by saying, " You are speaking in vain, for the King can hear no longer." The clergyman, however, leant over him and said, " If you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and hear my voice, give us some sign," when, to the astonishment of all present, the King exclaimed, with a loud voice, "Yes! " It was a last effort, and with it the King expired, at eight o'clock of the morning of the 29th of September, 1560. 3 1 Supposing he was released, as Dalin says, on the 15th August : but Celsius gives the date of his release as the 10th October. — Vol. ii. p. 344. * Celsius, vol. ii. p. 359. 3 Celsius, vol. ii. p. 359. This account of the last illness and death of Gustavus is taken chiefly from Geijer, who professes to have followed in many particulars a MS. account of the King's confessor. U 290 • GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. His body, together with those of his wives Catherine and Margaret, was conveyed from Stockholm to Upsala on St. Thomas's day, with all accustomed pomp and solemnity, and buried in the cathedral there, beneath an alabaster cenotaph elaborately carved, in the choir of the Virgin. 1 Gustavus, as described by his nephew Peter Brahe', was of middle height, 2 so well proportioned that what- ever he wore became him, with fair hair, piercing eyes, short straight nose, handsome inouth and hands, and a florid complexion. He had so good a memory, that places and names once observed carefully, and things once or twice related to him, were never for- gotten ; and though he had comparatively little book- learning or scientific knowledge, as having been taken early from such pursuits, yet his natural quickness to some extent supplied the deficiency, and he had a sounder judgment, and was better informed on several practical subjects, than a good many who a long time had made them their study. He had a taste for sculpture and painting, and was not only a good judge of music, but himself sang and played upon the lute, which he deemed the most agreeable of all instru- ments. His court was royally maintained, brilliant with native noblemen, illustrious foreigners, and fair and highborn ladies. Every day after dinner at an appointed hour they met in the ball-room, and danced 1 Scond. Must., torn. v. p. 120. 2 So says Ms nephew, but he adds, "something more than three ells." His height therefore rather exceeded 5 feet 10i inches English. Chap. XV. PETER BRAHE'S ACCOUNT OP HIM. 29 1 to the music of the King's band. Twice or thrice in the week the lords and ladies of the court accom- panied the King to the chase, or to walk, or in some other out-door recreation, and once every week the fencing-school was thrown open, and the young nobles encouraged to engage in that* and other knightly exercises. A gold ring, or a string of pearls, and the honour of leading off the dance with a lady of the court rewarded the victor. Gustavus took pleasure in the society of accom- plished and beautiful women, but neither before nor after his marriage was he ever accused of having any relations with them but such as are pure and honourable. In serving God both morning and afternoon he took great delight. "In a word, God had endowed him beyond all others with a great capacity, a powerful understanding, and many princely virtues, so that he well deserved to possess the kingly sceptre and crown ; for he was not only able and intelligent beyond others, but just and penetrating in his judgments, and in many respects tender of heart" 1 Instead of repeating the praises which have been accumulated upon Gustavus by later writers, some- times without discrimination, and sometimes with an almost total ignorance of his character, it will, I think, be more useful now briefly to review that cha- racter as I have endeavoured to depict it in detail — in its weakness as well as in its strength — and to 1 Peter Brahe, apud Geijer, vol. ii. p. 163. To his natural good dis- position mainly, perhaps, it is to be attributed that no blood was shed in Sweden to establish the Reformed faith. u 2 292 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. draw attention to the sources from which some of his characteristic faults seem to have arisen. The influence of Hemming Gadd, a wily politician of the Italian school, whose commanding abilities, friendship with the Stures, and hatred of the Danes, gave him an immense authority over the ardent mind of his young pupil, may be mentioned as the chief of those sources. With a political tutor of such a stamp it is not surprising that Gustavus should have been deficient in the straightforwardness and integrity which are the greatest ornaments of a great states- man, nor that the reproach which he cast upon Olaus Petri, of having a papistical conscience, 1 should have attached with far greater reason to himself; for he notoriously, nay avowedly, combated falsehood by falsehood, and acted habitually upon the principle that the end sanctified the means. In pursuance of this principle, when the interests of his country seemed to require it, truth and justice were unspar- ingly sacrificed. Moreover, by a not unnatural de- lusion, Gustavus was wont to identify those interests with his own. From providential circumstances the destinies of the Swedish nation, the chief part in a great revolution, political and religious, had been thrown into his hands. Through him mainly Sweden had been freed from a foreign yoke, rescued from the trammels of an established superstition, and ren- dered prosperous by the increase of her foreign trade, 1 See Appendix. "Correspondence concerning the Chronicle of Olaus Petri." Chap. XV. REVIEW OF HIS CHARACTER. 293 and the development of her internal resources. It was Gustavus who held the public purse, received and paid for all, in case of need melted down his plate for the public service, and in flourishing times filled his coffers with the superfluous revenue. It is easy, therefore, to understand how in his imagination the ideas of his country's welfare and of his own advantage would become inseparably blended, and how the maxim " L'etat c'est moi" would be suffered to throw a veil of patriotism over an acquisitiveness not always kept within due bounds. It was a corollary from that maxim that indivi- dual claims should give way to those of the monarch, and we find accordingly, that they were sacrificed, not only in respect to property, but in respect to rights of which men are still more jealous, and, per- haps, even in the sacred interests of the heart. Gustavus was not probably by nature more suspi- cious than others ; but the stratagems which Hem- ming Gadd taught him to consider legitimate weapons of political warfare must have tended to make him so, and his own experience confirmed the habit. While still a youth he had been the victim of Chris- tian's treachery. His companion in arms had be- trayed him. The Lubeckers had overreached him. As he advanced in years, some of the friends whom he had most honoured and trusted had quitted his side. Accordingly, in the decline of life he was on the look-out for treachery, detected sedition in the sermons which denounced oppressors and exhorted 294 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. to mercy and pity, and personalities in the histories which represented the Swedes as bad paymasters, and said of past generations that "they who had given much to churches and convents had not become poor, neither had they grown rich who had robbed them." l At last he was disturbed by constant fears of being cheated by his bailiffs, and overcharged by his tradesmen and labourers, and employed a system of espionage, not only over the disaffected districts, but over his confidential officers, and even over his own son, which far overpassed the bounds of a legiti- mate and paternal vigilance. It would be an ungrateful task to dwell upon the defects of illustrious men, if it were not instructive to observe their consequences. In the case of Gustavus the worst consequence, as far as the world is generally concerned, was the discredit which some of those defects brought upon the Reformation. As to himself and his people the consequences were many, and more or less disastrous. We are satisfied that the servants, who were equally suspected whether honest or dis- honest, had one motive the less for retaining their integrity ; we know that Eric retaliated upon his father the espionage which the latter practised against him ; that the King's disregard of moderation and justice multiplied his enemies among all ranks, and 1 Gustavus, in his strictures upon the Chronicle of Olaus Petri (Appendix to Chron. Laur. Pet., p. 158), observes that, even if the Swedes did not pay well, he ought not to have mentioned it, since, as the saying is, " it is an ill bird that fouls its own nest." See Appendix. Chap. XV. REVIEW OP HIS CHARACTER. 295 was the cause of more than one insurrection; and that the Dacke war was protracted, to the imminent peril of his crown, because the Smalanders could place no confidence in his promises. To the same sources, possibly — if not to an over- worked brain— may be ascribed the feeling of isolation and desertion of which he complained in his latter days ; and the want, in his last hours, of a comfortable sense of pardon and acceptance, which, though it is the privilege of every true penitent, is seldom perhaps realized in all its fulness, except by those who, before the shadows of their life have lengthened, have striven to live in all good conscience both towards God and man. Passing from moral faults to infirmities and errors of judgment — of all the political errors of Gustavus, the greatest seems to have been the virtual dismem- berment of the kingdom, through the extensive duchies conferred upon his younger sons. Distrust of Eric, and a preference for Margaret's children, both probably urged him to make this arrangement, which, the King moreover thought, would keep in check the richer nobles at the same time that it restrained the eccentric ambition of his eldest son. The alternative of passing him over, and conferring, the kingdom upon John, a project once seriously entertained, was rejected, perhaps, as being fatal to that hereditary settlement which he thought at once most advan- tageous to the country, and the greatest security for continuing- the monarchy in his own line. But, as 296 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. his grandson, Gustavus Adolphus, observed, " The younger brothers were too powerful for subjects, 1 and a more prudent prince than Eric might have complained (as he did) that " his father had prepared for him diffi- cult days when he bestowed upon them the duchies." Some other measures of Gustavus, e.g. the prohi- bition of the exportation of cattle, and the fixing a maximum price upon those sold in the country, may probably be excused on the ground of his ignorance of the true principles of political economy. If indeed he believed, as he said, that " the graziers were losing money" by the maximum, it was a pal- pable piece of injustice to maintain it, and benefit the consumer, by interfering with the natural laws of buying and selling, to the loss, and perhaps ruin, of the producer. But Gustavus in all probability did not believe what he said. He found it convenient at the moment to represent the matter so to the Dales- men ; but he thought, most probably, that his mea- sure was only reducing the grazier's profit within a reasonable compass. His error, however, whether partly moral, or simply political, was one of the chief causes of the Dacke war. Turning to the other side of the picture, we per- ceive in the prosperity of the industrial interests of the kingdom, in the foundation laid for its progressive improvement in art, science, and learning, and, above all, in the care to promote that knowledge which is the greatest glory and the greatest safeguard of a 1 Appendix to the Bimchronica of Charles the Ninth. Chap. XV. REVIEW OF HIS CHARACTER. 297 people, the energy, diligence, and wisdom, generally- speaking, of this great King. 1 As a Keformer of the Faith he was, as might have been expected, severely dealt with by the Romanists, and represented, not only " as a spoiler of churches and a heretic," but, what was assuredly a most undeserved calumny, " as an infidel or a heathen." One of our popular Church historians has, with a far more pardonable extrava- gance, run into the opposite extreme ; but if Gustavus scarcely deserves the robe of sanctity with which Milner has invested him, 2 he was far from being a religious reformer from policy alone. He was deeply convinced that the reformed doctrines were the reflec- tion of God's own truth ; and not the less so, because, like other inconsistent men, he did not in all things follow their guidance. It was, however, under the impulse of strong conviction, and with an unfaltering purpose, that his reforms in Church, no less than those in State, were prosecuted. Three or four great objects were continually before him — to enlighten his people by God's pure word, to preserve them from foreign domination and internal discord, and to implant among them the arts and the blessings of peace. These things he deemed necessary for their happiness, and 1 In 1525 he sent one of the monks of Vadstena, Benedictus Petri, on a mission to convert the Laplanders. — Diar. Vads., p. 219. He appointed Michael Agricola, a native of Finland, to the bishopric of that see, and by his means obtained for the people of that province the Bible, Prayerbook, and books of elementary instruction in their native tongue. — Geijer, vol. ii. p. 145. 2 Milner, Church Hist., vol. v. ch. ix. p. 139. 298 GUSTAVUS VASA. Chap. XV. these he never lost sight of. It may be added, that, though possessed of a power far greater than that of many a nominal autocrat, he despised no class of his subjects, but endeavoured to reconcile all to his policy, in the first instance at least, by good reasons and fair words ; and that he gladly saw numbered among the nobility those, who though sprung from the people, vindicated their claim to a noble rank by their talents, their diligence, and their virtue. In a word, if he had some great faults, he had many splendid virtues. His aims, as a ruler, though not unmingled with personal ambition, were in the main pious and patriotic, and in that capacity, and in his private life, he exhibited a character firm without ob- stinacy, merciful without weakness, courageous with- out display, chaste amid the blandishments, and undazzled upon the eminence of a lofty station, and loving peace while the days of chivalry still lingered. His people acknowledged at last the deep debt which they owed to his incessant_ vigilance and labour, and some of the most enlightened Swedes, of every age since his own, have acknowledged that it is not with the commonplace flattery of an epitaph, but by a title well deserved, that he is described upon his tomb as the "Father of His Country." 1 1 " Hie Rex Gustavus natus est anno 1490 in principem et guberna- torem Sueciae, Gothiasque assumptHS 1520. Postea in Regem electus 1523. Coronatus autem 1528. Obiit 1560, astatis sueb 70. Regi- minis sui 40." And on the same tablet, "Gustavus, Suecorum, Gothorum, et Vandalorum Rex, Pater Patriae, belli artibus, pacisque clarus, victoriis Celebris tembilis hosti, suisque cbarus." — Messenii Tumbas. ( 299 ) APPENDIX. No. I. GUSTAVUS'S CORRESPONDENCE CONCERNING THE CHRONICLE OP OLAUS PETRI, A SECRET HISTORY OP HIS OWN LIFE, &C. 1 Gustavus to Olaus Petri- Calmar, August 5th, 1541. We need not remind you, Master Olof, that you some time ago began writing certain histories and chronicles, which you had partly extracted and compiled from the chronicle of Dr. Erick, canon of Upsala, with respect to whom it is ob- servable that he is much more gracious to the old bishops and the privileges of the clergy than to the kings and nobles of the realm. " Now you are well aware that the factious and seditious practices and cabals of the said bishops did to the princes and rulers of the kingdom notorious injury and damage ; and though no doubt many useful things may be found in that chronicle, yet they are combined with many others tending rather to rebellions and disobedience to kings and rulers than to peace and unity. Since, then, you were ready enough to compile and publish such histories and chronicles, it seems to us that it would not be amiss if you 1 From the Appendix to Laurentius Petri's Svenska Chronica; Scrip. Rer. Suec, vol. ii. sec. 2, p. 151. 300 GUSTAVUS VASA. were to think of writing histories of such a stamp that peace' and unity might result from them. It is therefore our serious command and injunction that you immediately undertake to write upon the times which reach up to and concern us : wherein you will find far more advantage and profit than in those histories which you have hitherto written and published ; and though you, no doubt, need not be told how all things have sped from the very beginning of our government until now, we nevertheless in this letter give you to understand the heads of the said transactions, en- treating amd commanding you that you will hereafter ex- pand them into a narrative, omitting nothing. First — How King Christian acted towards us, 1 our fathers' kingdom, and its inhabitants generally. Also how and through what great fights and dangers we arrived at our throne. Also what injuries, dangerous plots, and conspiracies were got up against us on various occasions both by natives and fo- reigners. Also how the Papists of the kingdom behaved themselves towards us. Also how the Lubeck war was waged against us and our kingdom. Also Barent von Mallen's rebellious proceedings. Also how our subjects the Dalecarlians, the Helsingers, the Smalanders, and many others shamefully and without any ground rose up against us. In a word, all that has occurred in our times and is fit to be included in history, we enjoin you to write in careful history -fashion, sending it when finished to us by the first opportunity ; and as we are minded to let our painter make pictures from the said history, therefore the sooner we see it finished the better pleased we shall be. Prom our Castle of Calmar. — Dated as above. 1 His mother and two of Ms sisters died at Copenhagen in the dungeon called the Blue Tower, to which 'they had heen consigned hy Christian. His other wrongs from the tyrant need not he again re- corded. APPENDIX. 301 Grustavus to Ms sons Eric and John. (Extract.) Gripsholm, December 23rd, 1554. We cannot conceal from you that Bishop Botvid of Strangness has fallen under our displeasure on account of the Chronicle of the late M. Olof, which he has had secretly transcribed contrary to our wish, of which he had received sufficient intimation ; for 'seeing that the said Chronicle fre- quently misrepresents the Christian princes and rulers who in former times bore themselves manfully and honourably in this kingdom, and who on the other hand gave little or no just ground of complaint, we have before expressed an unfavourable opinion of the said Chronicle, and said that we could by no means approve of it until it should have been put forth in a better and more authentic shape. * * * * We have also understood that a secret memoir of our reign is somewhere in existence ; and, seeing that they will not let it come to light during our lifetime, there is reason to believe that we are not represented there under the most favourable colours, though God knows we might have ex- pected from them, after all our toil and trouble, very dif- ferent treatment. We are informed too that Peder Erici, chaplain of Stockholm, knows a good deal of the late M. Olof's secret practices, and possibly something of that his- tory which they are so reluctant should see the light. It was he too who sent to Bishop Botvid the copy of the afore- mentioned Chronicle, which the latter had transcribed. It is our gracious will, therefore, that you send the said Peter Erici to us with all the documents formerly belonging to M. Olof, which he has secretly acquired and preserved. It were desirable also to ascertain whether he or any other have in their possession anything relative to the seditions 302 GUSTAVUS VASA. which the bishops of the olden time stirred up against their lawful rulers ; for such practices should in all reason appear in the said Chronicle, since they were generally the cause of the calamities and ruin which fell upon the kingdom, and yet M. Olof does not even touch upon them in his Chronicle. Dated as above. To the same. Gripsholm, December 25th, 1554. We send you back the trumpeters and other musicians which you sent us ; for at our advanced age, and with some- what that obliges us to be thoughtful, we can have little pleasure in any musical instrument, or indeed in music of any kind, and so had rather that you, to whom it is far more suitable than to us, should employ the same to your own delight and gratification. Further, dear sons, as we gave you to understand in our former letterjconcerning the late M. Olofs Chronicle, a part of our clergy has taken vast pains that the said Chronicle, con- trary to our wish and injunction, should be circulated amongst the commons, and still more amongst some of the nobles, and others of our subjects who perhaps, v on account of certain estates, owe us no great good will. And seeing that the said M. Olof was formerly Chancellor to Mathias Bishop of Strengness, and that the Bishops as well as the other ecclesiastics of that time were much engaged in the govern- ment, or had a hand in the production of State registers and State papers, we have no doubt that the said M. Olof pre- served such documents, and in the course of time compiled from them his Chronicle. It were therefore very desirable to ascertain who is in the possession of the said' documents, and we enjoin you accordingly to give your heart to the APPENDIX. 303 matter, and use all your zeal to find out who has concealed them. We cannot but think that they will be found either with M. Peder Erici, concerning whom we wrote to you before, or with Bishop Botvid of Strengness, or with the Bishop of Upsala ; for we are given to understand that these were the chief counsellors of the deceased M. Olof, and knew most of his secret practices. It is indeed a heinous sin that he in his Chronicle should throw the chief blame, that Sweden so often formerly came to distress and ruin, upon the Christian rulers who did their best to maintain its prosperity, but with all their zeal and labour could do no more than they did owing to the traitorous proceedings of the Bishops. Had M. Olof been willing to write the said Chronicle as a true historian ought to write, then assuredly he would not have passed over in silence the traitorous proceedings which the Bishops in former times engaged in, &c. &c. We cannot but observe, moreover, when we carefully read over the said Chronicle, that he had rather a papistical spirit and conscience than a true evangelical spirit; and whereas we have for five-and -thirty years, as everybody knows, conducted our government with the greatest vigi- lance and labour, and have by God's help behaved ourself therein no otherwise than in a manner Christianlike and satisfactory in the sight of every honourable man ; still we understand that lie or some of his party have written an account of our reign that is almost worthless : for since they will not let it see light while we live, it is to be feared that all things are hot represented there to our advantage, though God knows we have by our great care and labour deserved from them and from all others in the kingdom very different treatment ; and it is indeed grievous that, after all the anxiety and toil we have undergone for the benefit of the people, we should have no other recompense to expect 304 GUSTAVUS VASA. after our death than such unjust detraction ; and we are not a little surprised that the clergy will be so bold as to wish to rule and reform lords and princes when they know that it is written, " Reges gentium dominabuntur ; vos autem non sic." It is fitting, therefore, to have an eye to their pro- ceedings, and permit no more to be written of Christian rulers and princes than is honourable and can be proved. It is therefore our express wish and prayer that you will search and inquire as far as possible whether any of the aforementioned old papers and documents, or that concealed Chronicle which has been written of us and our reign, can be found with Peder Erici or elsewhere in Stockholm, and send it afterwards to us. Finally, it is our wish that you send no troops to Finland until we are further informed of the state of that province ; for, seeing that Skaregarden is everywhere frozen, it is scarcely possible, without great danger and cost, to send our troops across, and we hope, through God's mercy, that the danger there is not so great as reported, seeing that our commandants in that quarter send us no further tidings respecting it ; we should nevertheless be glad that you used all your diligence to ascertain the truth. We have also written to our commandants in the aforesaid province on the subjects mentioned in your letters. Dated as above. Postscript. * * * * We have resolved to go down to Westgothland this winter, and in order to travel by sledge the journey must not be long delayed. Now it seems to us that it would not be advantageous or advisable that we should all go down together, and leave this part of the kingdom deserted, but rather that some one should remain here and watch over our subjects, so that no disturbance may arise while we are APPENDIX. 305 away. We wish you to let us have your opinion upon this as soon as possible. We think it also desirable that he who remains in this province should proceed from time to time to Upsala, Vesteras, to this place, and other districts, but so as never to be long together or far distant from Stockholm, and to be always watchful for our interest and that of the realm. To Lawentius Petri. Gripsholm, December 24th, 1554. You no doubt remember, dear Bishop Lars, the differ- ences which for many years existed between ourself and your late brother, chiefly because he would interfere and fain reform much in the government, a matter which his office did not require of him, and which he wanted reach of understanding to perform satisfactorily. He behaved him- self, and that often, in such a manner with respect to us that we should have been fully justified in permitting him to undergo the punishment which he had incurred. But that the doctrines of the Reformation might not thereby suffer, we have often blinked at his offences, and committed the matter to the hands of God, who in all things judges right. But besides this, he has written, contrary to our injunc- tion, a Chronicle, that is of little value, in that he in many places misrepresents the Christian rulers, princes, &c. For instance, he writes that Sten Sture the elder was chosen Regent by the commons for the sake of a last of ale, which is a great insult not only to him but to all the people of Sweden, &c. &c. Again, he imputes to the Swedish people the disgrace of having very often provoked the Danes to bring war into our land,'but the traitors who held with the Danes, and who x 306 GUSTAVUS VASA. were the true authors of our calamities, he lauds and praises almost throughout his Chronicle. We must also observe that the said M. Olof had rather a papistical conscience than a true evangelical spirit, in that he does not condemn the practices of the traitor bishops, but rather excuses them in their traitorous deeds. There is much also in the said- Chronicle, if one had only time to read it over carefully, which is contrary to the very treatises which he himself wrote and approved of when he first began to preach and reform the teaching of the Gospel in this country. From whence it is evident that the said Chronicle does not tend to any improvement or edifica- tion of the people (as ought to be the case), but rather to set them against their lawful rulers, which too often happens. We have accordingly expressed our judgment of the said Chronicle plainly enough, that we could not sanction or approve it, but would have it altogether laid aside and not come into use until it shall have been corrected and put forth in a better tone and with more foundation of truth. We have, nevertheless, understood that"our said mandate has been little heeded, but, on the contrary, that the said Chronicle has been more and more circulated amongst the nobles, and those who have some understanding, from which in time more harm than good will come. We therefore earnestly enjoin you to exert yourself that the aforesaid Chronicle, wherever it may be found, be finally laid aside and disused until it be corrected ; in forwarding which you will do us a pleasure. We also wish you to send us all the copies you can lay your hands on, for you are well aware that no books can legally be published except cum Regis gratia et privilegio. [Here the King complains of the secret Chronicle written of his own reign— of the proneness of the clergy to attempt APPENDIX. 307 the reformation of rulers —much in the same strain as in his letter to his sons. He concludes by urging the Archbishop to send him that Chronicle and the State papers, which (he supposes) must have been in the possession of Olaus Petri, and left by him either to the Archbishop himself, or to Bishop Botvid, or to Peder Erici.] No. II. EXTRACTS FROM GUSTAVUS'S STRICTURES ON THE CHRONICLE OP OLAUS PETRI. 1. The King complains that Olaus Petri compares those Swedes of the olden time who were in the command of castles and fortresses to giants, dwarfs of the mountain, and other misdoers, and at the same time the traitors to their country to warriors and men of honour. 2. That he attributes the dissensions between the Danes and Swedes partly to the pride of the latter. 3. That he affirms the condition of Sweden to have been as prosperous under foreign as under native princes. 4. That he declares all that the old historians wrote about the justice of the Goths and Swedes was false. 5. That he pays his countrymen the compliment of say- ing that they were bad paymasters, which, even if it were true, he ought not to have mentioned, seeing that, as the saying is, " it is an ill bird that fouls its own nest." 6. That he praises those who founded and built churches and convents, and endowed them with their own possessions, and at the same time condemns them who put an end to such an unprofitable kind of religion, saying that they who have given much to churches and convents have not become x 2 308 G-USTAVUS VASA. poor, neither have they grown rich who have robbed them ; at the same time that the said M. Olof was the first to urge that proceeding (which he now condemns), but now in his writings he would fain retreat and turn his coat, which no honourable man is wont to do ; all which is a manifest slur upon the known truth of the Gospel. 7. That he says, when the people pay the King tax and toll, they have a right in return to law and justice, as if law and justice were perverted or withheld from any in the kingdom. "For we appeal," says Gustavus, "to every honourable, just, and Christian man, that none has cause for complaint on that ground." 8. That he bespatters all Christian rulers, and calls them Ladubrott (barn-breaks) and not Ladulas (barn-locks), and says, moreover, that Magnus Ladulas deserved to be called a Roman Caesar ; — for what we cannot conceive, except by reason of that falsehood and detraction whereby he was minded to pull down the good name of all honour- able Christian potentates and rulers. 1 1 The passages alluded to in this charge and in JSTo. 7 are these : — " For it is the duty of the ruler to protect his subjects from injustice and violence, and on that very account he takes of his subjects toll and custom. For that tax which the peasant pays the King he ought to be protected by law and justice ; and with the same right that the King demands tax of the peasant, may the peasant claim law and justice of the King. This Magnus Ladulas well understood, * * * and that Ladulas is a noble name, conferring upon King Magnus more honour and praise than if he had been called a Roman Cassar. In truth, there are not many in the world who can be called Ladulas ; Ladubrott have always been more general." — Olai Petri Chron., p. 254. " Quid de hisce correctionibus et castigationibus dicendum sit norunt historiae periti. Quorsum vero amor patriaj viros magnos, immo viros doctos subinde abripiat, ex scriptis hisce eristicis, in loco illustri positis, alii quoque discant." — Edit. Rer. Suec. Script., vol. ii. sec. 2, p. 160. APPENDIX. 309 No. III. ON THE VALUE OP MONEY AND COMMODITIES DUBING THE BEIGN OP GUSTAVUS VASA. There is a treatise on this subject by Hallenberg, to which Geijer frequently refers, but I have not been able to pro- cure it. It appears however from the latter that the Swedish mark, which equalled 8 ore currency, equalled in 1523 also 20 skillings in silver, and, reckoning the silver rix-dollar at 4s. &d. (as there are 48 skillings to the dollar), the mark was then worth Is. lO^d. of our money. For some time after 1527 the coinage was debased, and the mark was only worth 16 skillings in silver ; but in 1555 it had again risen in value to 20 skillings. 1 The Lubeck mark was, according to the Lubeckers' com- putation, equal to two Swedish marks ; but Gustavus found, by an analysis made in 1538, that it was not really so. 2 However, the difference was probably small. The debt to Lubeck therefore of 77,290 Lubeck marks may be estimated at 150,000 Swedish, or at about 14,000?. The total expenses of the war of liberation, exclusive of the cost of reducing Finland, were 960,000 Swedish marks, = 400,000 dollars, = 90,000/. 3 In 1524 the klippingar were called in. The real value of the klipping was 9 rundstycken, but it passed for 18 pen- ningar, = 41 rundstycken, that is, for more than four times as much as it was worth. 1 Geijer, chiefly from Hallenberg, vol. ii. pp. 51, 53, 1 39. 2 Tegel, 1538. 3 Geijer, vol. ii. p. 51. 310 GUSTAVUS VASA. But the King, though compelled to call in the klippingar, did not like what he called too fat a coinage. To the com- mandant of Abo, who had sent him the proof of a. new coinage, which he thought of too high a standard, he wrote — " They have put into the pot more than was needed of that which is most costly. Thou knowest well thyself that one can come more readily at cabbage than at bacon, and that, if one puts too much bacon in with the cabbage, this becomes unwholesome, and disagrees with those who eat it." ' The rates at which the peasants were permitted to com- pound for the coronation tax in kind, imposed in 1526, is a tolerable criterion of the money value of the commodities enumerated at that time. 2 They would, however, probably be rather below than above the market price. The commutation price, then, for — A Tumia of Barley = 4{g Winchr. bushels, was 1J Marks = 2s. 9$d. Rye = , , , , 2 , , = 3*. 9rf. , , Pease = , , , , 1 , , = Is. 10%d. An Ox 8 , , = 15s. 1 hundred Iron 1 , , = Is. 10§d. It appears therefore that the price of barley was about 4s. 8d. a quarter : that of rye about 6s. Bd. Comparing these prices with those of April, 1549, when corn was selling well in the mining districts, we find that barley had risen to 7 ore the spann, i. e. to If marks the tunna, and rye to 2 5 marks ; i- e. barley was about 5s. hd. the quarter ; rye about 7s. Barley-meal was then selling at 8 ore, and rye-meal at 10 ore the spann. 3 1 Geijer, after Hallenberg, vol. ii. pp. 53, 137. B Tegel, 1526. 3 Letter to Anders Ersson, p. 266, supra. APPENDIX. 3 1 1 The average price of wheat in England for the last eight years of Gustavus's reign, viz. from 1553 to 1560 both in- cluded, was about 8s. 2d. of our present money. 1 From the above table I have little doubt that the maxi- mum price fixed for a pair of oxen was not 16 Danish but 16 Swedish marks ; for if Bruzelius be right in estimating 16 Danish marks at 8 r.-dollars banco, the maximum price was less than half the commutation or fair price of the time when the law was in operation, and this is quite incre- dible. Some other commodities appear by the table to have been enormously high in comparison with corn. For I have noted the commutation price of — 1 lb. of Bacon, 10 Skillings, = lljrf. 1 , , Cheese, 12 , , = Is. l§d. 1 , , Butter, 20 , , = Is. lOjrf. — but Tegel probably intended by the lb., not the skalpund = 14-H oz. avoirdupois, but the lispund = 20 skalpund. A pound of butter, on this supposition, sold for about the seventh part of the average price of a bushel of barley. 2 The retaining fee for the soldier enlisted, but not yet called out, was 12 marks or 22s. Qd. per annum. 3 The pay of a foot-soldier on actual service (supporting himself) was 4 marks a month = M. 10s. a year ; of a horse-soldier 8 marks a month, or 9?. a year. A captain of infantry had 6 marks a month, and a lieutenant 5. The foreign troops were better paid. 4 The price of a staffrum, about a cubic yard, of firewood, 1 Wealth of Nations, Appendix to vol. i. p. 356. Edin. 1817. s i. e. for rather more than a penny. The price of butter in the Cumberland dales, about a century ago, was three halfpence or two- pence a pound. Hartley Coleridge's Poems, vol. i. p. xxvi. 8 Letter to Nils Larson, p. 251. i Geijer, vol. ii. p. 139. 312 GUSTAVUS VASA. 1 delivered at the mines of Sala and Fahlun, was two ore or five skillings of silver — less than sixpence. From these items some idea may be formed of the value of the currency, as compared with silver, and of the prices of labour and other exchangeable commodities, in the time of Gustavus. THE END. LOHDOK ! PB1KTED Br W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET. Wa m m